Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank and compliment Deputy Doherty and Sinn Féin for bringing forward this very important topic for debate tonight. I acknowledge the presence of the Minister of State, who is a decent and honourable man. We wish him nothing but good luck in his role. We will be relying on him 100%. The problem is as outlined in the Bill. We want to bring down the cost of claims and we want to give the savings back to the customers. Young people are paying enormous sums trying to get on the road. Young boys and young girls want to get the wheels underneath them and to get on the road to earn a living, go to work and do what they have to do in their lives.

We have serial complainants. I have no problem in the world with people claiming if there is a serious accident or if something happens, but one thing that should happen in the courts is that a person's previous history of what I call "misfortune" should be taken into account, in other words, if they seem to find holes in the road to fall into or if they seem to continuously be bumping and humping into people along the road and claiming. Why does that not come out during the course of a court case? Why is a person's record not laid bare to see if he or she has previous claims? If somebody is continuously claiming, there is something continuously wrong. We have had situations in places such as Kenmare and Sneem where businesses were flooded. Sometimes people find it awfully difficult to get insurance again afterwards. We must be able to take on such situations and make sure businesses can get insurance and that they can be up and running and have proper cover.

With regard to bringing down the cost of claims, one thing to do is ensure that there is due vigilance and when claims are made that they conform to the rigour of the law. If an individual gets an amount for one type of damage in England or in any part of Europe, why should a person be able to get double the money here? I am not trying to make little of it but a person often got a lot worse than a soft tissue injury or a sore neck on a football field or playing hurling and he or she managed to keep going afterwards and there was nothing about it. Why is it that in Ireland there seems to be this game of going to the courts? It is like an industry in itself. That is wrong. It should not be allowed. Somebody has to pay. There is no such thing as a free lunch. It is the customer who is paying and I want to stand up for those customers here tonight.

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