Mr. Éamonn R. Downey:

I and Mr. Dempsey met the Minister of State, Deputy Brian Hayes, Tony Smith from the OPW and members of the Irish national flood forum, under Enda O'Donovan, on Thursday morning in Skibbereen. We are out of our depth here, but it was heartening to see their level of knowledge on the issue, because that will eventually lead to the problem's being sorted out. Insurance companies can pick and choose what risks they want to take on. This is an open market and markets traditionally balance themselves over time. What we are trying to avoid is disadvantage. I will ask Mr. Kavanagh to speak about the unavailability of insurance, the reasons insurance is sometimes not available and the solution to that.