Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I think Deputy Doherty is absolutely right to highlight that risk. I want to be clear that we had a lot of discussion around this in the working group about what this might mean - exactly as the Deputy laid it out - the fear of capture of our Garda Síochána by a particular industry because there was some direct relationship in pay, which I think is what the Deputy was hinting at. It is a concern that we debated and which we are still going to look at. Because it works and because we have seen that it works in the United Kingdom as a successful model, the insurance companies thought it might be a good thing to pursue here. One will see in terms of the actual recommendation that it is to explore the potential for their co-operation between the insurance sector and An Garda Síochána in relation to insurance fraud investigation. This is one potential avenue that is being spelled out here in terms of doing this but it still needs a lot of discussion between the relevant Department, which is the Department of Justice and Equality and the Garda Síochána as to its actual implementation. It is being pushed very strongly by the industry side but I think it is absolutely essential that on our side, the Government and Oireachtas side, we remain cognisant of those different issues. The reason that it has got some traction is because it happens in the United Kingdom and they have those same concerns but the concerns have not been realised.