Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I did quote exactly what the Minister of State said on the radio. I have the direct quote from "Morning Ireland", where to me, it is clear to me that he was saying that this legislation would deal with it. It is good that he has clarified that it is not and that the Central Bank will do so and that a report will be done. This is something that my colleague, Deputy Doherty, has raised consistently. He even made a complaint in 2019 on this, which played a significant role in this.

As this meeting is only scheduled for an hour, I will move on to another issue. The personal injury guidelines came into effect on 24 April with a view to significantly reducing the cost of claims. The latest information from the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, PIAB, shows that since it came into effect, the average value of personal injury awards has fallen by 40%. As soon as the guidelines came into effect the insurance industry warned that premiums would not fall immediately. Consumer surveys conducted by Sinn Féin and the Alliance for Insurance Reform found that these reductions are not being passed on to policyholders in the form of lower premiums. Deputy Doherty introduced the Judicial Council (Amendment) Bill in April, which has been delayed by this Government for nine months. The legislation would have required insurers to inform the Central Bank of whether a reduction in claims costs as a consequence of the person injury guidelines have been passed on to consumers and if so by how much. The Government justified its opposition to the legislation saying that the national claims information database, NCID, would provide this information. However, yesterday, several insurers were before the committee and when I asked about this they replied that the NCID could not provide this information. The Central Bank said the same last week. Will the Minister of State accept that the Bill is a good tool to apply pressure on insurers to ensure that cost reductions arising from the guidelines are passed on euro for euro to consumers?