Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Anti-Austerity Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I did not think I would be speaking for another ten minutes, but it seems that we do not have a Labour Party speaker for this debate. The Anti-Austerity Alliance–People Before Profit group will support this Bill. While we believe it has some weaknesses, we think it has significant merit and we will be casting our votes in support of it. I salute the campaigners in the Gallery who have travelled from the four corners of the State to see this debate. It is indicative of how strongly they feel about this issue, how badly they have been affected by flooding in recent years and how unfairly they have been treated. The starting point in this discussion has to be whether the current system of operations is working fairly and in the interests of ordinary people. I suggest that by any standards, the system is failing people across the board. The memorandum of understanding between the Office of Public Works and the insurance industry that was hammered out a couple of years ago, which relies on the goodwill of insurance companies to get to grips with these issues and to deliver fair play, is a joke. I can show that it is not coming close to delivering for ordinary people by mentioning that according to a statistic I saw today, there could be over 50,000 homes in this country without flood cover. Something needs to be done about the current system because it is broken and is not working. This Bill is an attempt to address it.

It has been a busy day with the water charges proposals etc. but I have been able to keep a close eye on the monitor while working in my office. I listened to what the two Government speakers had to say earlier in the debate. The Minister of State, Deputy Canney, made some interesting points and showed a certain understanding of the problems this issue is causing for people, even if I would not agree with the solutions he proposed. I have to say I was struck by the manner in which the Minister of State, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, having started by saying he is aware of these issues because of flooding in his own constituency, started to talk about the problems this proposal would cause for the insurance industry without going into any detail about the pain, suffering and problems being faced by people around the country. He said that if this Bill is passed, it "could have the effect of deterring potential entrants to the market" and lead companies "to withdraw from the household insurance sector". He suggested that these proposals go against the way the market is meant to operate and, as a result, the Government could end up "providing compensation to insurers", which he referred to as "players" in this situation. I have to say I felt that the Minister of State's cold speech was really out of touch with the problems that people around the country have been facing.

The Minister of State should reflect on those points.

In terms of some of the issues to hand, I am elected to represent the constituency of Cork North-Central. Householders in Cork are three times as likely to be refused flood insurance cover as householders elsewhere in the country despite the fact there has been significant investment in flood defences in recent times. Tens of millions have been spent on flood defences in Fermoy, Mallow and Skibbereen, yet large numbers of ordinary householders and people trying to run businesses, including small and medium size businesses, cannot for the life of them get flood insurance cover, despite knocking on all the doors, shopping around and following all the advice they are meant to follow.

Statistics from the insurance industry have been quoted in the debate about the percentage of people who are being covered when they come asking. I want to put on the record that I do not believe those figures because they do not tally with the reality of what I hear back from people who are trying to get insurance for their homes and businesses. There is no guarantee - far from it - that, even with flood defences in a town, a person will get cover from the companies. Of course, it is not just in Cork. There is a similar situation in the town of Clonmel and the example has been quoted in this discussion of the estate in Derrymullen, Ballinasloe, where €1.5 million was spent on flood defences in the area yet a majority of houses, some 60%, still have no flood cover.

I would point out it is the same Government which has let the industry off the hook and which has also displayed a real lack of urgency when it comes to some of the key flood defence projects. Cork city is a case in point. Proposals for a €60 million to €80 million flood defence system go on display in Cork on 12 December but we were told over two years ago, when the bad floods hit at the turn of the year in 2014, that the work would be well under way in 2016. While the point has been made in this discussion that construction will start in the second half of next year, some sources are saying that even that is not guaranteed and it could be 2018 before work begins. That is not good enough. There is a real lack of urgency in regard to that project and it is not the only one in the State I could refer to.

We will be supporting the Bill for a number of reasons. We think the idea that boxing off the ability of the insurance companies to refuse cover is a positive and boxing off their ability to quote completely unrealistic, sky high premium prices is a good move. We do not have any great faith in the Financial Services Ombudsman or the Central Bank but the power to intervene with the insurance companies, while not perfect, is better than nothing in that sense.

I said earlier I felt the Bill was not without its weaknesses. For example, it refers to a fair, reasonable and appropriate response and price. However, what is a fair, reasonable and appropriate response? It is left rather vague. The insurance industry will argue, and it would seem it has some supporters on the Government benches, that if an area floods every year and the Government has not built flood defences in the town, a fair, reasonable and appropriate price might be very high and outside the ability of someone to pay. It is too vague and leaves the door open to profiteering of that kind.

We had the Oireachtas report on car insurance last week and talk of people being thrown to the wolves. We are dealing here with a ruthless mob of cut-throat profiteers and corporate gangsters. One could put manners easily enough on an unruly child; it is more difficult to put manners on an unruly gangster. The old saying of the labour movement, that one cannot control what one does not own, points to the need for something that was in the motor insurance report, namely, the idea of a State-run insurance company that would provide insurance on the basis of people's needs, rather than profits. We will continue to raise those points but we will vote for this Bill.

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