The Bradford East MP David Ward has proved a tireless campaigner in tackling the problem of huge insurance premiums for drivers.

One of the issues he has identified is that the cost of insurance is driven up by the increasing number of personal injury claims, many of which are pursued due to the encouragement of companies set up expressly for the purpose of obtaining payouts from insurance companies for drivers involved in accidents.

While it is right that such payouts should be made in genuine circumstances, there are sadly a number of motorists who are persuaded to claim when they might not have suffered a genuine injury that requires such compensation.

Now Mr Ward is calling on GPs to play their part in weeding out the fraudulent claims from the genuine ones.

This, according to local GPs, isn’t perhaps as easy as Mr Ward might hope it is, and have suggested it might be something of a “headache” to police.

Whiplash injuries are notoriously difficult to prove or disprove, as they rely on the GP being told the level of pain that the patient is suffering which could, in the fraudulent cases Mr Ward fears are on the rise, be exaggerated or even invented by those unscrupulous enough to want to cheat the system.

Perhaps what’s needed is a new set of medical tests and a nationwide programme of training for all GPs so that they might be in a better position to judge whether the whiplash injuries they are being presented with in the surgery are, in fact, genuine.

Mr Ward might well have a headache on his hands but if he and GPs can find some common ground with this it might ease a lot of pain for motorists struggling to find affordable insurance.