Mr. Speaker, many people across Canada have found the dramatic increases in insurance premiums to be quite debilitating. According to the Insurance Bureau of Canada, insurance claims costs in Ontario were more than 50% higher during the last quarter of 2000 than during the last quarter of 1999. Last April, Statistics Canada reported that auto and home insurance premiums had risen 26.3% and 6.7% respectively.
In addition, there has been considerable coverage in the media addressing the great increase in the insurance industry's profits, which exceeded $2.6 billion in 2003. This is calculated to be almost 675% higher than the previous year.
Taking these numbers into consideration, I ask my colleagues in the chamber to become involved in working together federally and provincially in addressing this issue.