Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Níl drogall ar bith orm mo thacaíocht a thabhairt don rún seo. Guím comhghairdeas ar Fhianna Fáil as ucht an rún a chuir os comhair na Dála. I am delighted to support this motion and I have no hesitation in doing so. This motion has been brought forward by Fianna Fáil but it is because of the outrage on the ground among ordinary people who are struggling to pay their bills, their water bills - those who are paying - their property charges and now a hike in insurance. I have heard of quotes going up 300-fold.

Let us put this in context in that it is obligatory to have car insurance but there is very little public transport. Rural areas were mentioned but people are also forced into cars in cities, including in Galway where I am from. The one and a half page document, if I can call it a document, given to us by the insurance lobby group is a lazy, unbalanced and self-serving. It has chosen to present certain facts while ignoring other facts. This is part of a campaign by the insurance companies that started with the abolition of juries and moved forward to the setting up of the former Personal Injuries Assessment Board. Now the industry is putting the blame on anybody but itself.

There was an interesting article in the newspaper yesterday, which I would say Fianna Fáil Deputies have read in detail because they have quoted from it. However, we should give credit to the person who has pointed all of this out, the former chairperson of the MIAB, Ms Dorothea Dowling. I do not think she is a friend of the legal profession. She certainly highlighted the inadequate information given by the insurance companies. For example, in 2014, there were 31,576 claims and of those claims, all Ms Dowling and the courts can account for is 9,046. That means 22,530 claims were settled by the insurance companies but they have not given a single piece of information as to how the claims were settled or what they cost. However, they lambast the legal profession for its costs and they give out to the Garda for not doing its job but there is no obligation on the insurance industry to disclose any information as to how it is settling claims. Insurance companies point to fraudulent claims while failing to point out that legislation is in place - the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004 - which gives huge powers to the courts to dismiss claims if there is any sign of a fraudulent claim or an exaggerated claim. The industry does not refer to that legislation.

The industry gives no information on the number of policies repudiated by it. It is unacceptable for insurance companies to mount a campaign to force further changes without putting their hands up and saying: "We have increased costs by over 300% and 400% in certain cases". The industry has made huge profits but has not accounted for those profits. Dorothea Dowling points out that in the UK, which it wishes to copy in terms of the care culture rather than a compensation culture, the industry is breaking even but in Ireland it is making huge profits.

The Sinn Fein amendment should also be taken on board because there is some merit to bringing the insurance companies before the finance committee and giving them a grilling, not least for their failure to give any information.

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