Results 7,141-7,160 of 15,555 for speaker:Eoghan Murphy

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: The national database will publish data at an aggregate level publicly for everyone to see, whether it is a potential entrant to the market looking to compete here for business, the Central Statistics Office or even this committee, in order that we can know exactly what is happening and consider trends in the market.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: There are a few issues. The first is the introduction of Solvency II, which should protect most insurance entities from ever having to fall into a liquidation or administration scenario. That is a major change in Europe that will give some good protection. The Central Bank has increased its market intelligence in terms of understanding how entities are being regulated in their home...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: There are two issues. If a company is regulated abroad, it is not regulated here but the Central Bank regulates the operations from a code of conduct perspective. The bank also has a markets intelligence unit - I cannot remember its exact name - but it does this work. The Central Bank has been at the forefront of pushing for greater convergence when it comes to the supervision of insurance...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I have seen no evidence to suggest there are cartels operating in the insurance industry. The Senator would be aware that the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission is looking into this now because of information brought to its attention.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: With court awards we want to arrive at a state of consistency in the awards being given. There are a number of processes under way to achieve that consistency, bearing in mind the separation of powers and the fact the Government cannot directly intervene in awards. One of the pieces of work being done by the personal injuries commission is to bring about international benchmarking and...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: The commission is new and was established by our cost of insurance working group earlier this year. The former President of the High Court, Mr. Justice Kearns, is the chairperson of that commission and it has other people involved. It is working to a timeline and terms of reference detailed on page 99 or 100 in the cost of insurance working group report. It is essentially doing...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: No, but we have the newly established Court of Appeal, and it has proved to be very successful in overturning the size of awards given by either the lower courts or the High Court. That has been an important mechanism for arriving at more consistent and fairer awards from the public perspective. The Personal Injuries Assessment Board will continue to work with the Court of Appeal judges and...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: It is very important that we have consistency here and that we have fair claims being paid out. We should do nothing that would impinge upon the ability of someone arriving at a just award for the injury he or she has suffered. We have to protect the legitimate claimant as well.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Yes. That book of quantum was the first book published in approximately ten years. We want to publish the book of quantum on a rolling basis, at least every three years, if not more frequently. We are also looking at a whole new type of book of quantum, which in the ideal scenario would be published by the Judiciary itself, but that is something for it to decide to do. It would contain...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: What is the action number?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Are we talking about the uninsured database?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: The first thing to acknowledge is that when the Government first tried to put in place an uninsured database to track uninsured drivers a number of years ago it failed and the Garda stopped using it because it was delivering a number of false positives. It is not a simple thing to do and we need to make sure that we are doing it right because we do not want the Garda rejecting it again. I...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Yes, kind of. My officials have said that to me and I should not have repeated it.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: To be clear, there are some problems in trying to make this work because we do not want to make the same mistakes that were made in the past. While we have been able to get action No. 61 back on track and into a green space, the other actions which flow from it, actions Nos. 62 and 63, which are due to be completed next year, have moved into the orange space, unfortunately. I chair a...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I do not have the actual framework for the plan but the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport is the responsible actor here. The Department of Justice and Equality might be the lead actor, but the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport is responsible for this. We are continuing to work with it. As it has a number of measures it must complete under this plan, it is as pressed as...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: This is recommendation No. 22 under action No. 45. It was flagged as being partially completed but with a further delay likely. The review has been commenced, but it has proven more difficult than anticipated to establish the reliable set of data and therefore the relevant action point was not completed for the first quarter. A data set based on the aggregation of cases submitted for...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I heard an anecdote, I do not know if it is true, that when a person died in a motor accident for the first time ever, the coroner's report said that this must not be allowed to happen ever again because it is something that is absolutely preventable. The cost of insurance working group is looking at the cost of insurance and it prioritised motor in the first instance. It is not for want of...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: This significant issue is being raised with us in our work on employers' liability and public liability insurance as part of second phase of this process. During my recent engagement with the Law Society, I raised the issue of suspected claims harvesting by solicitors' firms. We will continue to work on that one.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: That is what I am looking for. Since we began our work on the second phase of this process in January, a number of representative bodies have made these claims in front of the working group. I have met them formally and informally. We are looking for hard evidence. It is going to be a difficult thing to pursue. We cannot do anything unless we have actual evidence. When I met...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Motor Insurance Costs: Minister of State at the Department of Finance (1 Jun 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: As I said in my opening statement, I am hoping to do this in July. I think three or four things will need to be tackled if this problem is going to be properly solved for businesses. Some of the things that are being done on foot of the motor insurance report - for example, with regard to the Personal Injuries Commission - will flow into the costs that are being paid for employers liability...