Results 61-80 of 24,635 for speaker:Mary Harney
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: In other words, this is direct contact between the insurer and the insured?
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: The documentation in which the PIAB will have an interest is medical advice and medical evidence. I am not sure it will want to have a host of other documentation. Is the Senator saying that if the PIAB becomes aware of this, it is privileged?
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Does the Senator mean in subsequent legal action?
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I will get legal advice on the Senator's amendment. I am open to accepting it subject to legal advice.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I reject the amendment. It is inappropriate as the Personal Injuries Assessment Board is not restricting parties' decisions in any subsequent litigation. It is now the exception in litigation for doctors to be called as witnesses since the content of exchange reports are usually agreed.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: What we are talking about here is the medical report the claimant will submit to substantiate the claim. Clearly the claimant will ask, seek or inquire of the doctor whether he or she will give a report on their medical condition. I would have thought it a form of consent if one asks a doctor to give a medical report. The doctor gives the report to the claimant who then makes the application...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: The assessor and respondent gets the report, but that is not quite the public domain. The PIAB assessor will have the report to make the assessment and the respondent will have a copy of it. That is currently normal practice. Doctor-patient issues are a different matter.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: It can be seen by the respondent.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I will try to explain. If the claimant makes a claim with the medical evidence, it goes to the assessor. It may go to the medical referees who work for the board. Obviously it will have to go to the respondent. It would be totally unreasonable and very unusual if a claimant claimed he or she sustained particularly injuries and the respondent was not aware of the medical allegations being made...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Is the Senator referring to a freedom of information request?
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Not the medical evidence of a particular claimant.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I will clarify that matter. It would not be acceptable to do a freedom of information request to find out if Mary Harney made a claim and to see her medical evidence. What we are talking about is making the information available to people who need it in order to carry out their job. The information will not go on the website or be published.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Under the current regime it takes a great deal of time for one to get one's entitlement and six times longer than in the UK. The whole purpose of the Bill is to expedite the delivery times so people can receive their entitlements much more quickly. There are specific time limits in the Bill. We are talking about a period of 15 months from the time the claim is made. The claimant has a year in...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: If the Senator is referring to the legal issue as to who is responsible for a particular case I am not getting involved in that. The entire working of the PIAB is based on simplicity of approach. Form filling will be simple and clear. The PIAB will itself be involved in educating the public and disseminating information as to procedure. It is about doing things in a consumer friendly way. I...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: There is an initial period of nine months and then a further period, in certain cases, of six months.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: That is the idea.
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I certainly cannot accept this and if I do the PIAB will be killed before it starts and everyone knows what will be the effect of that. There are times when the respondent may have full indemnity, for example if an employee falls off a chair at work, the respondent may decide to pay the compensation and then to sue the chair manufacturer. We cannot have a situation whereby in order to use the...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Does the Senator mean after the 15 months has elapsed?
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: Currently it takes a couple of years for a claimant to get a case into court. Only about 10% of cases end up in court, 90% are settled either in advance of the hearing or at the door of the court. Even under the current system very few cases go to court. My Department has received strong legal advice from the Attorney General on this legislation. The kind of safeguards that we would all want...
- Seanad: Personal Injuries Assessment Board Bill 2003: Committee Stage. (24 Nov 2003)
Mary Harney: I will have plenty of work for the Senator. He need not worry about that.