Ms Jacqueline Thornton:

Exactly. Only 3,000 cases have been settled. They tend to have lower materiality – lower claims – and take the direct settlement and PIAB routes. In respect of material claims, some awards through PIAB in particular are being rejected outright and claimants are instead going to court. The insurer then has to sit and wait for those cases to go to court. Some claimants are not responding to the insurers, which means the insurers do not know what is happening with the cases and provision has to be made accordingly to pay the legal fees and, potentially, the claims if the awards have been declined or settlement offers have been made. Our members would agree that they want to be spending less money on legal fees when that money could be going somewhere else.