Donie Cassidy (Fianna Fail)

It is essential that there is competition in the insurance market. When I started an inquiry in 2003, as Chairman of the Joint Committee on Enterprise and Small Business, the cost of insurance was the second largest item of expenditure on the balance of every company and family business. The cost was unsustainable and many families and businesses were not properly insured. We put the case to the insurance industry, with all of the major players present, including brokers, IBEC, SMEs, including Mr. Pat Delaney and his team at the Small Firms Association, and asked them what we could do to help. At the time the chief executive of Hibernian Insurance said Ireland was not a safe place in which to do business. I asked the representatives at that meeting to come back and let us know what they required. When they returned, they told us they needed four Bills to change the regulations in place. For 18 months we went about our business and the Government, under three Ministers and the then Taoiseach, Deputy Bertie Ahern, brought forward those Bills which transformed the insurance industry and made Ireland a safer place in which to do business.

The setting up of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board presented the first challenge. The second was to pass the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004 that forced everybody who made a claim to swear an affidavit in order that the "no foal, no fee" policy in which solicitors were engaging at the time would make people think before they signed the affidavit. If any part of a claim was found to be fraudulent, the costs of both sides would have to be paid by the person making the claim. This eliminated an enormous number of claims.

The third challenge was to pass the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005. There were major developments in the construction industry and the health and safety elements that were missing at the time are now in place.

The final challenge was to allow for random substance testing to take place on the roads. This has resulted in the saving of between 100 and 150 lives each year. All of these challenges were met owing to the hard work and dedication of the joint committee under my stewardship.

The Quinn Insurance Group was exemplary in providing competition in the marketplace. It was the most efficient and most committed of insurance companies. I know that on many occasions the group within five days provided a field sergeant to visit a person who had had an accident and that two or three days afterwards the person concerned received an offer to settle the case. That eliminated huge expenditure on legal and repair bills. The reason for the group's success has been its efficiency. It is an exemplary Irish company which employs 5,500 people here, many of them in the midlands and Border areas, areas which have been finding it difficult to attract employment.

The Financial Regulator has to be complimented on what he has done. He protects policyholders and we support him fully. The Minister for Finance has congratulated him for what he is doing in the name of Ireland plc. Having an insurance policy gives us certainty. We feel certain we will be fully covered, which allows us to sleep at night. It allays the worries of employers and property owners. However, we must understand that two years ago many businesses dealing with banks or insurance companies might have thought they could have a loading of 50% paid and 50% owing. With the new valuations today, it could be 85% on one side and 15% on the other. These are exceptional trading circumstances which are unprecedented. A successful 90-year old man told me the other day that he had never seen anything like it in his lifetime.

I thank the Minister of State for coming to the House at such short notice. We intend to allow the debate to roll over and will continue to seek to help the Minister of State and his Department, the people, the Quinn Insurance Group and the Quinn family. We want them to continue the good work they are doing but they must do so within the terms of the regulations made under the 1983 Act. We will fully support them in every way we can in order to keep competition in the insurance market.