Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)

There have been levies before so the industry will be familiar with the Insurance Compensation Fund and the 1964 legislation. I think the levies lapsed some time in the early 1990s so the companies would be familiar with the situation.

The main requirement of the domestic industry is that there should be a level playing field between companies which operate in the Irish market on a subsidiary or a branch basis. Their main fear with the existing arrangements was that an authorised firm could convert its business into a branch and therefore evade the levy. This possibility has now been removed by applying the levy to all policies relating to risks in the State, whether these are sold by a branch or by a subsidiary. International industry is satisfied that the legislation addresses their needs, their main concern having been that because of the scale of their international business, they would end up paying the bulk of the levy. Their view was that this would force most companies conducting such business to leave the country. They have indicated they have no difficulty paying the levy on insured risk in the State. This reiterates the point I made about the risk of losing jobs if the levy were imposed on the risk written here-----

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