Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank all Members who contributed to this crucial debate, including my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, who proposed the motion. Having listened to all of the contributions, it is obvious that the issue is a very real one in every constituency. The anecdotal evidence includes examples of premiums doubling or trebling in some cases. The CSO has confirmed that premiums have risen by 60% since the beginning of 2014 and by 24% in the past 12 months.

While I welcome the fact that the Government is not opposing our motion, it must be acknowledged that we are debating this matter because of inaction by the previous Fine Gael-Labour Government. As with so many other issues in the past, they failed to listen to warnings on this side of the House. Consequently, motorists have continued to pay crippling and exorbitant premiums. I will cite an example.

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At the end of last year my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, during Leaders' Questions with the then Tánaiste, Deputy Burton, raised the need to establish this task force. Her reply was that the price of petrol at the pumps was falling. Quite simply, that showed the lack of priority that was given to it. Last night, the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Deputy Mitchell O'Connor, confirmed that the data available to her Department from the Injuries Board does not support the sector's claim regarding the volume and cost of claims. However, less than 25% of claims go through the Injuries Board. There is an issue in that regard. The Department initiated a review of the Injuries Board in June 2014, but almost two years later the review is not complete. The Minister said last night that she hopes to seek Government approval of a draft Bill before the end of the year. What is the delay? Meanwhile, motorists are facing exorbitant, crippling premiums.

Last night, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, confirmed that he had been conscious of the issues for some time. However, it took until two months ago to establish a review. It is interesting how the review has suddenly become a task force. In reply to many of the parliamentary questions tabled by my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, it was always called a review. There was no mention of a task force. There is no clear timeframe for when this review is to report to the Minister. Will it take the same length of time as the Department is taking to review the Injuries Board? Will we be here two years hence still waiting for the conclusions of the review? The time for procrastination is over. It is time for action.

Yesterday, our party published a comprehensive action plan to deal with the exorbitant cost of motor insurance. One of its key pillars is the re-establishment of the Motor Insurance Advisory Board. We are not talking about reinventing the wheel. There is no need to wonder whether it will work because we have evidence that it worked in the past. When it was established in the early 2000s, the board contributed significantly to the reduction of premiums by approximately 40% between 2002 and 2013.

As a previous speaker indicated, we have all been contacted by various representatives of the different stakeholders to tell us it is not their fault that the cost of premiums is increasing. It is not the legal profession's fault and it is not the result of the insurance companies gouging people and seeking to increase their profits. While each stakeholder blames the other, the end user is being crippled. This is crippling jobs and having an impact on the cost of living and people's quality of life. A rural constituency such as mine does not have public transport. People need their cars to go to the shops, to work, to church or wherever they must go. At present, the cost of insurance is preventing people from using their cars, and it is preventing people who have two cars from using the second vehicle. We cannot wait, therefore, for an unknown length of time for a review - that suddenly has been ramped up to a task force - to report back on what must be done. The time for debate is over.

The Minister of State, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, whom I wish well in his new role, concluded by thanking Members for the opportunity to debate this important issue. We need not debate it further. We know what are the issues. What we need is action. By virtue of the fact that the Government is not opposing this motion, it is accepting its content. It is accepting the proposal to re-establish the Motor Insurance Advisory Board. We will return in a number of months to ask the Government what action it has taken to ensure that the men and women we represent do not continue to pay crippling motor insurance costs indefinitely into the future. They have been paying such costs for the past two years, which is too long. The time for that is over, as is the time for debate. The time for action is now. We will return before the summer recess to ask the Government what it has done with regard to the motion that the Dáil is now going to pass.

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