Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise one other matter before concluding. Before becoming a member of this committee, I was involved with the committee dealing with the environment. One of the concerns we dealt with recently concerned the geo-zoning of areas by insurance companies and the position where certain households, because they were in a particular zone, were unable to avail of flood or subsidence insurance and so on. A strange comment was made one afternoon by the representative of the Irish Insurance Federation indicating there is no clear correspondence with regard to insurance in areas where flood remediation measures have been carried out.

The Department and the Minister of State's predecessor spent significant sums of money in recent years on such works, yet households in those areas still have difficulty in obtaining household insurance. Also, the insurance companies continue to geo-zone those areas as places at risk. Perhaps it is not a function of this committee, but I would be grateful if it could examine the regulations with regard to how domestic or home insurance operates. I would be grateful too if the Minister of State could give some indication at a later date as to how the Department interfaces with the insurance industry with regard to works carried out by the Department.

My city was flooded this morning by a tidal flood. We rarely get fluvial floods, but we did a couple of years ago. A number of businesses are in difficulty currently due to the fact that some works are waiting to be done. These works are probably listed for completion in the next two to three years, but insurance companies just give a blanket refusal to requests for insurance by these businesses. If a guarantee was provided that the required works would be carried out over a one to two-year period, those companies might be able to get a particular type of insurance, with an excess in place. For example, a retailer might not be able to get insurance on the property for the two or three-years period while waiting for the work to be done, but should be able to have stock to hand insured. A further difficulty for such retailers now is that major suppliers, such as Musgraves, are questioning supplying stock to them because they feel the stock is not safe. This is a huge issue for businesses. For companies trading on a one-to-one basis, any difficulties with stock and cash flow will create a huge crisis.