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

I compliment Deputy Michael McGrath on bringing forward the motion. To be fair to him, he has championed this issue for many years both inside and outside the House. The contributions highlight the seriousness of the issue and the geographical spread of the Deputies raising the issue shows that it is not isolated to one particular pocket of the country.

I acknowledge that the Government established a working group late last year to examine the issue, but it was late in coming to the game and acknowledging the problem in the insurance market. As a party, we published recommendations early last year and the main difference between our recommendations and those of the working group is that ours were made about 12 months earlier.

Listening to the concluding remarks of the Minister of State and to him on Radio 1 earlier, he seemed somewhat content that the figures of the Central Statistic Office, CSO, showed that renewal premiums were static. That is not good enough.

It is welcome that premiums are static but it comes on the back of an increase of 11% in 2014, of over 30% in 2015 and 12% in 2016. The progress report for the first quarter of this year indicates that three of the ten items have yet to be fully implemented. The Minister of State indicated the working group involving owners of small public vehicles has yet to meet and I understand the taxi federation has not been invited to such a meeting. It is critical those people are invited to that meeting.

The Minister of State has heard many examples from my colleagues and I could add to them. There is a lady with 20 years of claims-free driving who has seen her insurance go from €400 to approximately €800. I know a man who drives a van as the second family vehicle. The family is into sports such as triathlons, and it has bikes and surfboards. He cannot get insurance for the van because it is not being operated commercially. We have seen insurance for companies increase by a huge amount over the past number of months and years. The recommendations are there and the Minister of State has said he wants us to acknowledge that he has established this group. He will not acknowledge that he is not affording this the priority it deserves.

The Minister of State asks what can we do faster. We know the minority Government in this Dáil means there is a lack of legislation going through this Oireachtas over the past year. Why not prioritise the legislation that will give effect to proposals in this report. The Minister of State argues we cannot give false hope to constituents, and we should not do so, but we should say to them that while we cannot decrease premiums this year, we will accelerate the recommendations in the report and the legislative proposals arising from it to ensure that next year, they will not be crippled by the high cost of insurance. The Minister of State has sat on his hands for too long. I ask him to accept this Private Members' motion in the spirit in which we put it forward.

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