Mr. Conor Faughnan:

On the question of the cost of insurance in this country compared with the United Kingdom, we can see the Irish tendency to bash ourselves. In fact, we are miles ahead of Britain in terms of motor and other liability insurance. Ten years ago insurance premiums were double the price of those in the United Kingdom, but now they are only 50% of the UK average price. That reduction is a consequence of the work done by people such as Dorothea Dowling and her colleagues at the Injuries Board. The United Kingdom, on the other hand, is sleepwalking towards a major crisis by allowing the legal industry to do significant damage to consumers. Anybody who is unfortunate enough to be at home during the day watching British television will know what I am talking about.

These advertisements comprise payday loans that target the unemployed and ambulance-chasing solicitors encouraging people to come forth to sue. Everybody has to pay for this. The average insurance premium in the UK is approximately €1,100, more than double ours. We need to give ourselves some credit in this regard. The UK actually needs to learn from us on this and not the other way around.

To echo what Mr. Niall Doyle said earlier, the gender equality ruling is an absolutely monstrous decision. The law is an ass; sometimes pan-European law decided by a committee can be a monstrous ass. This is a significant injustice to a large cohort in our society. The two words “equality” and “fairness” are often used in Irish debate as if they have the same meaning. They do not. They are different words with different meanings. We are forcing equality into motor insurance at the clear expense of fairness. It will seriously inconvenience Irish women, particularly young women drivers. I will declare an interest as the AA has up to 100,000 motor insurance customers. We are having to gear up for this. There is no excuse for it. We are now having to tell our women customers that the law has been changed in order to be unfair to them. It is not a great point to make to one’s customers. The decision is out of our hands and it is an absolutely appalling decision with which we have been saddled.