Joe O'Toole (Independent)

I thank Senator Donohoe for allowing me to speak ahead of him. I declare an interest in that I was very involved in the drafting of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board legislation and in its passage through the House. I am currently the vice chair of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board. I was also very active on the joint committee which inquired into insurance a couple of years ago.

I welcome the Minister of State and thank him for his important contribution. I do not intend to disagree with any of the significant points he made but wish to add to them. Since Governments made insurance a big issue - the Minister of State will recall it was an issue when he was a Member of this House - the cost of insurance reduced by almost 41% until January 2008. However, it has gone up by 17% since then. I want the Minister of State to recognise that in the context of small businesses and individuals.

Many people are gloating that Quinn Insurance appears to be in trouble. I completely support what the Financial Regulator did and was delighted to see him do it quickly. Over the past year, however, some people in the insurance industry have been thinking that the Financial Regulator and the Government have been busy with the banks and that nobody has been taking any notice of them. Prices crept up over the past year, in particular in the first six months of last year and in the first couple of months of this year. We need to look at that and protect businesses. As late as this week, a speaker at an insurance conference said cheap insurance companies tend to be failed insurance companies.

Let us be clear. Quinn Insurance is not in the same category as PMPA. PMPA went out of business because it was using premia to try to pay for claims. That is not what happened here. As the Minister of State rightly pointed out, what happened here was that for a combination reasons, the tier 1 solvency level of Quinn Insurance was breached. It is a technical and an important issue. I understand and appreciate the way Quinn Insurance responded to it but the Financial Regulator was right.

Our job must be to support Quinn Insurance in working its way through this and to maintain confidence in the industry. Quinn Insurance is a good business model, and I say that as someone who works at the edge of this business through the Personal Injuries Assessment Board. It introduced direct insurance, longer opening hours and early settlement which is now a huge part of every company's policy, and it was the first company to go on-line. It has been a trail blazer in many ways.

There is no clear indication as to which Minister is responsible for insurance. That should be made clear and I ask the Minister of State to convey that to Government. We need to keep Quinn Insurance in business and begin every speech we make, as the Financial Regulator did this week, by saying that policyholders do not need to worry because this can be done. We also need to recognise that Quinn Insurance is not like PMPA or Anglo Irish Bank. In fact, it has been a victim of and infested by the problems of Anglo Irish Bank. My colleague, Senator Wilson, and others will make the case about employment and what the company is doing. From a disinterested point of view, I would say we must ensure there is no attempt to undermine confidence in Quinn Insurance. Some 5,000 jobs are on the line, which the Minister of State mentioned.

When PMPA went bust in 1984, an insurance levy was brought in which remained in place until 1993. When ICI went bust, another levy was brought in. Both levies paid off the money owed but a 3% insurance levy is still being collected for no reason. It is purely a tax. That is adding to the cost of insurance for small businesses and individuals. Will the Government look at that as soon as possible? I will not make outrageous or outlandish demands that it be done next month but I want it to be top of the agenda.

More than anything else, I want the Minister of State to recognise that what has gone on here is manna from heaven for other insurance companies which are very happy to see Quinn Insurance in trouble. As public representatives, we must be very careful to support and even applaud the Financial Regulator for taking action but we must also recognise that Quinn Insurance is a good, solid and sound company which has made a few mistakes in terms of its solvency which can be put right and that it is in the interests of insurance policyholders and all the people involved that it remain to the fore in this industry.

At another time, I would like a longer debate on some of the other issues creating costs in insurance. For instance, Personal Injuries Assessment Board costs could be reduced if the Government looked more closely at the regulation which is allowing challenge after challenge to take place to what is probably one of the better ideas to come from Government over the past ten years. These are serious issues and I would like the Minister of State to convey our thoughts to Government and ensure it acts on what we have said.