Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

My thinking is twofold. First, we must work out practical issues between the OPW and the insurers in terms of a flow of information. The Irish Insurance Federation must be confident that the information we give its members is the full picture and that it would disseminate the information to its member companies. There is, however, a wider issue. We will be in a better space when we have all signed off on the catchment flood risk assessment and management studies, CFRAMS. The entire country has been divided up into river basin catchment areas. There is a more corporate view on flooding maps and all of the issues that surround the potential occurrence of flood risk. When I first went to the office in Trim two years ago I asked the engineers about the size of the problem. It was said to me in a direct way that there are 250 hot-spots around the country where at any given time we could have flooding or a major event with significant loss to business and homes. Putting the CFRAMS in place and signing off on the process following agreement at European level will provide a corporate view. We are not there yet. We have to sign off on the process by the end of 2015 and the maps must be in place by the end of this year. We will all be able to say then that at least we know where the risks are and where the potential work must happen. It will be important for the insurance industry to know our schemes in the future so that we will be able to continue to roll out the schemes, as long as we have money to do that.