Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 11 July 2019

Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

Consumer Insurance Contracts Bill 2017: Committee Stage

Photo of Pearse DohertyPearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This amendment has the effect of deleting section 8. It is highly technical, as we have heard from the Minister of State, but the consumer protection code is not on a legislative footing and that creates some grey areas in respect of consumer protection. We should use this Bill to enhance as much as possible, and to put into primary legislation, consumer protection and transparency issues. I will discuss the Minister of State's amendment with experts in this field to ensure it captures all the issues raised in the original report and, if required, I will seek to amend it on Report Stage. It is important not to have crossovers with existing regulations and put them into another Bill because they work against rather than for consumer interests.

I have no desire to replicate anything. I will speak to experts in the field on the matter.

On the substance of the issue, we have a substantial change. The substantial change in the amendment from the Minister of State stems from the expression "within a reasonable time after concluding a contract of insurance". The proposed section 8 then stipulates the need for the insurer to provide a contract on paper or some other durable medium and so forth. In the Bill as drafted, the reference is to within a reasonable time before a consumer is bound by a contract of insurance. There is a substantial difference. Under the amendment, the consumer has to provide all the details after entering into a contract or after concluding a contract whereas originally the consumer had to supply all this information in a clear way before being bound by it. I am aware that we have cooling off periods in the legislation for non-life and life insurance. In some cases a reasonable time could be deemed to be outside the cooling off periods of 15 days or 30 days, depending on the insurance contract. That is a point of substance.

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