John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

If one makes a distinction between proprietary and pay to access and so on, I will make a distinction along the lines of the questions asked by Deputy Sherlock. In the public interest, it would appear that if this information was made available to the industry, we might have greater competition in the market. Therefore, it is a case of the country coming first. The information is necessary to get the country and its people right and, therefore, it should be made available to the industry.

The other side of that question is to make it publicly available across the board. We have heard where the Irish Road Haulage Association at an open forum asked questions of the insurance industry which the industry would not answer even though it knew the answers. The industry would not give a customer in the market the information that was required for the customer to make a commercial decision or to understand why the premium was at such a level. There is no flexibility on both sides.

There is no doubt that Insurance Ireland withholds the information. That has been the complaint from the outset. On the other side in respect of policy holders, they never explain or will not explain it even to the largest players like the Irish Road Haulage Association or the freight carriers. On one side, it is competition. What is happening is anti-competitive. The consumer is being short-changed and is not being given the information they need to understand why the insurance premiums have gone up. Those two questions echo those asked by Deputy Sherlock. Yes, there is frustration and anger because it seems that nobody wants to challenge the insurance sector. We do not know what is going on.