Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister referred to court cases in which people blatantly tell lies and there is evidence that what they are saying is not true. I am not talking about 50:50 decisions but about clear situations. The Minister should legislate so such cases are automatically referred to the Garda or, if it is the insurance company that would have the duty to do this, once the case finishes the company should have a duty to refer it to the Garda.

Deputy Pearse Doherty made an important point in regard to claims. People are worried that if they make a claim, their no-claims bonus will be affected, in particular that their insurance premium will increase by a considerable percentage when they go to renew it.

As we said, businesses are struggling. I appreciate the Minister's comments about PIAB and the good work it does, and I endorse those comments. However, my concern is there is no guarantee it will have the resources it needs. Obviously, it will be able to meet its statutory functions but we believe it needs to deliver a better service. The reason we put down this amendment is that we believe PIAB needs to be better funded than it is currently. It has proven itself to be an efficient organisation and it should benefit from the fact it runs efficiently, has made savings and has attempted to reduce some of the costs associated with cases, in particular by speeding them up. We need to deliver a better service and reduce the length of time people are waiting. In particular, we need to ring-fence the money. The Minister talked about taking the money out but it then goes into the black hole of the tax pot and we do not know where it ends up. Perhaps it could be given to the Garda for its insurance fraud squad because to have that funded by business is not acceptable to anyone and is a non-runner.

That is why we are going to press this amendment. I am disappointed Fianna Fáil has decided not to support that but that is its decision, although I accept it agrees there is an issue.

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