Past Wage Loss

The Supreme Court of Canada has said that tax consequences are not an appropriate consideration for a court in a claim for personal injuries. This means that the Plaintiff's loss is his or her ablility to earn income and the fact that some of that is taxable is not a reason to reduce the amount the defendant has to pay the Plaintiff.

In BC the government did an end run around this decision by making payments by ICBC for past wage loss only on a "net" of tax basis.

Is it right? Is it fair? Well, that is certainly open to debate, however, it does appear to be outside of the jurisdiction of the Provincial government, because they are essentially taxing the lost income of the Plaintiff through ICBC...which is in the exclusive jurisdiction of the Federal government an CCRA (formerly Revenue Canada).