Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for coming in. It is about insurance for thatched houses and I will return to that. One thing I hate is maths, but I was doing some just there based on the Alliance for Insurance Reform figures. The three companies mentioned, between dividends and profits alone, have €163.5 million, while families or pubs whose buildings have thatched roofs are unable to get insurance because of technicalities or a non-common sense approach that is without empathy. I appreciate companies must make profit and so on and so forth, but in Ireland we normally come up with empathy. I think it was at the public accounts committee that the insurance companies were in discussing instances of fraud and speaking about how they were compelled to put premiums up because of the thousands of fraudulent cases. However, Deputy Doherty asked the five main insurers how many such claims were reported to the Garda and they said there were no more than 116 or 120 between them, so it is misinformation.

We are here because we are trying to protect our heritage. The people who live and work in these houses and businesses are proud of them. The minute we go to the European Commission and get a statement to say the companies actually can do something about that we are then into a defensive mode. We will be told it is a bad idea. As far as I know, when this committee wrote to the European Ombudsman it was specifically about thatched houses and not any other kind of home, yet we move across to Insurance Ireland on it and it is kind of suggestive on it. I welcome that the statement says, "When it comes to a way forward, Insurance Ireland is committed to working with all stakeholders to work towards a viable solution for thatched properties owners". We already had two Ministers of State in here and in fairness to them they have committed to a pilot project on making stuff a lot safer and so on. To be realistic, the insurance companies are trading here and making very good profits. I do not know why there is not a bit of fair play or understanding in businesses that we now have a Government willing to put forward a pilot project to assist these homeowners and business owners with thatched properties, even financially.

All we have from the insurance companies is excuses. They say they do not want to take the risk. When you ring up for an insurance quote, everyone is an individual, so can it not be done as individual cases? The insurers are lucky they are not in Denmark, because they would have thousands and thousands of cases to deal with, whereas here they might have the capacity to deal with people on a one-to-one basis on this matter. There was another question on motor insurance. We see it when people are caught drunk-driving or drug-driving and are put off the road for a certain period of time. Those individuals had motor insurance prior to the offence, but when they go back in for a quote, having served their time, the insurance company says they are high risk and bumps up the quote by about 90%. The individual then has to go back and get three different refusal quotes, which is degrading, before they can apply to, I think, Insurance Ireland to instruct the original insurer to give them a realistic quote for insurance. Why can this not be done with thatched houses? If somebody has insurance and we will say the premium is €250, some of the insurance companies are moving out of the market and the ones that are staying are saying this person is high-risk and we want €2,000. Is there a mechanism for those people to go to Insurance Ireland and state this is the same house, that they have not had a fire and they are improving it all the time? Despite this, it is at the behest of the insurance company whether these people can get insured or not. I appreciate the companies say they must make a profit, but we seem to be nit-picking. The word that was said a while ago was that it was microsectoral. That is magic word. It is cherry-picking. There was mention of public liability coming down. It is a massive problem when it comes to fundraisers, events and so on. We lost our St. Patrick's Day parade last year and it is the insurance companies that are going to get the bad reviews for that. We have the hot rods in Ireland and the motorbike racing. These are all being cherry-picked at the moment and the premiums are going so high groups cannot afford to run these events anymore.

Going back to what the European Ombudsman said about the suggestion something could be worked with it, I do not know how it will be resolved but surely there must be some avenue whereby these people with thatched houses and businesses can get insured. As was said in one of the opening statements, there are the insurance companies that have stayed loyal and those people have stayed loyal to the companies as well, but they are not taking on any extra risks. People cannot understand how one company can decide it is safe enough to insure a premises but others can decide otherwise. I hope the witnesses can understand my points.