Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Is that not the nub of it? We are talking about huge increases in premia. The commission has received complaints. We already know the scenarios. Let us suppose a person's car has an NCT certificate, he is over a certain age, the car is roadworthy and he has never been a risk before. Then, all of a sudden, he is paying a 50% increase in his car insurance. There is no justifiable reason for it if insurance pricing is based on risk and there is no change to the risk. Then, obviously, there is behaviour within the industry that are determining the investigation. Can the commission compel the insurance industry to yield onto Caesar their databases, which show the level of claims that are settled out of court? We, as ordinary citizens, have no knowledge of this. That is where the gap in data materialises. If we are talking about absolute transparency, then we need to have access to the data. Now, from where I am sitting, there is only one relevant entity, aside from the Central Bank reports and the Injuries Board. It is opaque and there is no perfect knowledge relating to the data.