Mr. Paul Joyce:

There have been cases of what one would call inappropriate selling of mortgage protection policies, redundancy protection policies, critical illness cover and so on. These policies have been available to people drawing down mortgages and other types of loans for several decades. This arose in the context of the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman service. A number of people were sold policies that did not cover them. For example, someone would be sold a product that would technically only be available to someone working under a contract of employment, that is, directly for an employer. One would then find that the person was designated as self-employed and when he or she made a claim, no cover was available. It is a little like the tracker mortgage scandal. In Ireland, but particularly in the UK, there was a programme of restitution to people who had paid premiums and thought they were covered by policies only to find that the policy did not cover them.