The rising tide of anger nationally over health care reform boiled over in Connecticut Wednesday, not with protests but with a proposal -- as state officials called for major changes in how rate increases are granted on individual health insurance policies.

"Consumers must be empowered to stop chronic colossal rate hikes," said Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, who was joined by Kevin P. Lembo, the state Healthcare Advocate, and lawmakers.

The heart of the reforms is a proposed rule that rate hikes must be "reasonable" rather than simply "not excessive," as the current rule is written. Reasonable, Blumenthal and Lembo said, means affordability is taken into account in the decision -- something regulators cannot now do.

"Reform must require that regulators really regulate -- assess consumer ability to pay, hold open hearings, provide appeal rights and make rate decisions openly and accountably," Blumenthal said. "Courts must stop corporate greed and excess if the insurance department fails to do so."

Sen. Joe Crisco, D- Woodbridge, and state Rep. Steve Fontana, D-North Haven, co-chairmen of the General Assembly's insurance and real estate committee, pledged to introduce a bill with the reforms in the next legislative session.

The proposal comes after the state insurance department last week approved premium increases of up to 20 percent on individual plans from Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield. The approval scaled back the hikes from as much as 32 percent initially sought by Anthem. The health insurance industry says the discussion over costs is a valid one, but it can't be separated from the fact that health care costs keep going up.

"Talking about 'reasonable' and 'excessive' is a distinction that the attorney general is trying to draw without understanding how rates are set," said Keith J. Stover, a spokesman for the Connecticut Association of Health Plans. "There is no one in the marketplace that is trying to offer unreasonable rates. The rates reflect the cost of care."

Still there is pressure by Wall Street on large private health insures such as Aetna and UnitedHealth to build profits.

And some critics of the Anthem increase complained that executives at the company and other insurers enjoy high salaries and bonuses, while policyholders are seeing sticker shock in their premium payments.

Stover disputed that, saying: "In the context of a multi-trillion dollar enterprise in America, what any particular person makes doesn't have any bearing on price."

Lembo said the Anthem case is "symptomatic" of the need for broad reforms in the system, including mandatory public hearings for all rate requests on individual policies.

"Why is it that people, individuals and business have accepted increases in their insurance premiums?" Lembo said. "It's because they've had no power to change the outcome, no voice in the process. That all changes today."