CALGARY - What do you get when you fill a windowless room full of lawyers, insurers and actuaries for two days in mid-June?

The short answer is wildly divergent views on what people should pay to insure a vehicle in Alberta, especially in light of a ground-breaking court decision earlier this year that struck down the $4,000 cap on soft-tissue injuries.

And drivers might be the ones who are laughing the least as the winter snow starts to fall again, particularly if the insurance industry's request to boost rates by 37 per cent, or roughly $225 per year for the average driver, is approved.

On the other side of the debate is the insurance rate board's own actuary, who told the first day of hearings Tuesday that a decrease in injury claims over the past five years actually dictates a modest decline in insurance rates.

Making the rate board's ruling even harder is the fact that it is mandated to have a decision by August 1 to be implemented by early November.

That's well before the province's lawyers march into the Alberta Court of Appeal this fall trying to overturn the ruling that Alberta's cap on minor injury claims violated the Charter of Rights.

Board chairman Alf Savage admits it's going to be a tough call either way.

"The presentations this morning have been from one pole to the other,'' he said Tuesday. "And somewhere in between the board has to come.''

"It's going to be a very difficult decision. And it will probably be a controversial decision.''

Jim Rivait, Alberta spokesman for the Insurance Bureau of Canada, said Albertans facing such a huge insurance boost will "hopefully see the value'' in minor injury regulation.

Rivait said the 2004 cap which saved insurers millions of dollars on injury claims and sharply reduced premiums for most drivers "had a positive effect on creating a stable market.''

But without it, the bureau says that the rate board must either jack up everyone's insurance costs or allow insurance companies to boost the ceiling of the grid rates _ meaning those drivers with accidents and tickets on their record - by 37 per cent.

For those with spotless driving records, the industry wants "competitive market prices'' to help reduce pressure on rates.

In conclusion, the bureau warned there was a ``potential for huge price shocks to consumers,'' along with insurance availability concerns and a general de-stabilizing of the entire insurance system.

But rate board actuary Ted Zubulake said his number crunching shows that bodily injury costs have been coming down over the past half decade and are expected to continue to decline.

And that means Alberta drivers should be paying lower insurance rates, whether the soft-tissue injury cap is in place or not.

In the absence of any hue and cry from consumers, the Alberta Civil Trial Lawyers Association has taken upon itself to fight against the insurers.

Jeremy Taitinger, who was part of the team that successfully defeated the rate cap in a drawn out court battle last spring, agreed that the frequency of injury claims has been dropping since the late 1990s.

"The trend in Alberta since even before the reforms were in place was to decreasing claims costs and increasing insurer profitability,'' he said Tuesday.

"If the board raises rates ... Alberta drivers will pay for the insurance companies' failure to allocate proper reserves over the last number of years as they've earned profits well in excess of the five per cent that the board has mandated.''

On Wednesday, for the second and final day of the rate hearings, the board will hear from at least six more insurance companies on how the demise of the insurance cap has affected their business.