Gerry Horkan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am unsure as to whether Mr. Jewell saw any of this morning's contributions but one of our committee members asked about a nationalised or State insurer. I do not mean to keep coming back to Mr. Faughnan, who was speaking more as a representative of the Automobile Association on behalf of motorists than a broker - he would have experience as a broker as well - but he argued that even if the State did it, much of the cost would remain. He indicated that we should tackle the settling of claims and the lack of information about how they are settled. We do not even have data on the settling process, such as whether the legal costs are 90% or 10% of the total. We never see that process. Much of it avoids the Injuries Board and ends up in the courts, with costs involved. Mr. Faughnan was quite negative and I get Deputy O'Rourke's argument that we have been through all this before. It is my view as well.

We are not the only country in the world that has motor insurance. We are a small country and we do not have a road network all that different from many other places like Scotland or Scandinavia. We could argue that there are more rural areas than places like Germany, the UK or France but, equally, many places are more rural than we are. I would like to leave this third session of public hearings by saying if we can do A, B or C, we will either stop the price increases or, ideally, get a drop. We have discussed this for the guts of an hour at this stage. Is there anything that could be done to get a quick fix, although that may be oversimplifying the matter? We can look at marketing budgets, rent and rates. One gets the impression the money is all going out on claims. It would be interesting to find out the cost of overheads as a percentage of premiums. Is it a factor that the Aviva Stadium has that title? I presume that is what the witness was alluding to. Is it that one judge would give €15,000 for a claim but another would give €75,000 for pretty much the same type of claim?

I heard during the week that insurance companies have people in the courts and when they discover a certain judge is hearing a case, they are willing to go to court, but if there is a different judge around, they try to settle, even for double what they would initially have sought to settle for, as it would still be cheaper than dealing with the judge. This goes back to the book of quantum but if it is a case of only "having regard" to it rather than having it as a bible, the process might need to be considered more than insurance overheads. Are there two or three actions that could be taken that would go a long way towards trying to tackle the problem?