Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their presentations. It is very important to hear all the different perspectives. Is Mr. Faughnan concerned about the stability of the insurance industry as it is at the moment? Leading on from the lack of transparency around it, one of the questions since the failures of Setanta and Enterprise Insurance is who will be next. Consumers need reassurance when they are taking out insurance that in a few months down the line, they will not find that they have paid out this money for nothing.

When 60% of the claims go on legal costs surely we need to legislate to regulate the legal costs. It is disappointing because Mr. Faughnan has made some very constructive recommendations since last year but a year later people have to pay huge sums that they can ill afford and Government has not reacted more quickly. That is the job of this committee, to make sure we have a renewed focus on it and some actions are put in place.

In respect of fraud, I am concerned that the focus tends to be on consumer behaviour. That feeds into our reputation abroad for giving out huge compensation without really teasing out the 60% going on legal costs and we have ignored the International Monetary Fund's instructions to tackle these costs. Why is that not being done? This committee can do that.

Again, in respect of fraud, somebody is not doing her or his job. Mr. Faughnan referred to the police not having resources and that plays a part but the lack of transparency means we do not get proper figures on whether this is anecdotal evidence about fraud. Can we get specifics? That is what we are trying to do here, get down to specifics to get the data and analyse it. It seems that some of the insurance companies do not want increased competitiveness. I am concerned about foreign companies coming here but being regulated in their own jurisdictions when the Central Bank and other actors are not robust enough in respect of the regulations. That needs to be done before any new players come into the market.

The development of the independent medical assessment unit in Britain is a very concrete move and could be done here. The evidence in Britain is that it has served to reduce the medical costs. Mr. Faughnan has made some very constructive suggestions that can be worked on immediately.

I thank Mr. Griffin for his presentation as well. What formal engagement has he had with Insurance Ireland or individual insurers and what was the outcome of those discussions? Many of his suggestions are focused on measures that lay the blame on consumers or on reducing potentially legitimate pay-outs. I am a bit concerned that it goes back to consumers. Why should they be asked to modify their behaviour or reduce their expectations without any explanation of what has changed?

I congratulate him on the work he is doing on behalf of young drivers. I see how in rural communities, in particular, they cannot access employment because they will not get a job within a 10 mile radius of their home. Young people are being forced onto schemes that are often outside their jurisdiction and there is the threat of having their social welfare taken from them if they do not participate in these schemes but there is no public transport to access them. The situation feeds into poverty for young people who have already had their payments reduced but do not have equal opportunity to access employment, training and all the things that young people need to guarantee their futures.

Mr. Moran outlined exactly what I have seen in a rural setting for elderly people. It is one of the biggest contributory factors to the social exclusion of elderly people who have no public transport. If the local post office and shop have been closed down, they need their cars to participate in society and to get their necessities. He has the statistics for the number of elderly people involved in accidents and if that was broken down to show elderly people in rural areas, it would be reduced further. I am gravely concerned about the isolation that the cost of insurance for elderly people, who are often dependent on a basic income of €188 or €200 a week, is causing.

I thank all the witnesses for their contributions. They will feed in to the committee making some very valuable recommendations soon.