The insurance bill from declared natural catastrophes that hit Australia between early December 2023 and February reached almost A$1.6bn ($1bn), according to figures released today by the Insurance Council of Australia (ICA). Most of that (A$1.1bn) came from severe storms over Christmas, which triggered almost 95,000 claims, but ex-tropical cyclone Jasper produced a A$296m bill, and A$162m arose from storms in February.
After the ICA declared further storms that visited flash flooding upon New South Wales including Sydney this week to be a 'significant event', the state's premier Chris Minns announced his government would not allow fresh development in designated flood-risk areas.
IAG said today it had received 4,300 claims from the incident, over 80% of which were for property damage. Rival Suncorp has about 2,700 claims, of which over 2,100 relate to home damage, it said.
People:Chris Minns