Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I will conclude on this. Fraud in all forms has to be stamped out. AXA has a big part on its website about how fraud is increasing year on year, but the reality is that only 48 cases were referred to the Garda last year and only 63 cases the year before. There has actually been a reduction in the number of cases that have been referred to the Garda for fraud. If insurance companies are telling us they have 1,018, 1,048 or 3,794 letters inspected, why the hell are they not being referred to the Garda? That is the point. I am not asking the witnesses to respond but I am asking the insurance companies to tighten their ship in this regard and to stop claiming this is about fraud.

My final point is for AIG. One of the big issues we have seen probably in the past ten years has been the reduction of investment income, which has hit the profitability of the insurance firms, which has in turn resulted in an increase in premiums. We see now that AIG is investing heavily in the funding of apartments. For example, it announced €147 million in funding to Marlet, the construction company, for the construction of 596 apartments in the Grand Canal area, in Dublin 8. Is this something that insurance companies will be more involved in from now on? These apartments were funded by AIG without an end buyer, so there is no advance purchase agreement at the end. Obviously, finance is important for the construction of apartments. Is this a new trend that we will see more and more?