Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael)

When the Minister introduced the Bill in the House she spoke about a number of amendments she would bring forward to deal with concerns people expressed about the proposed change to the structure. She might comment on that when addressing this section.

A number of competitors in this field made the point that, at its most basic, the Bill appeared to give the VHI further commercial freedoms and a huge change in its capacity without requiring it to become subject to regulation. The issue of dominance was raised by many people. The Minister said that she would deal with that issue in her amendments. The VHI will remain exempt from company law requirements, for example, meaning that legally it could not be put into insolvent liquidation like any other company and that it would retain its unlimited state guarantee. The Minister said she would deal with that issue.

A number of other points were raised about inserting dates for solvency, etc. The Minister might broadly address under this section some of the changes she said she would introduce in regard to the concerns expressed about the dominance position of the company, the solvency date and the structures.