John Crown (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 4:

In page 6, between lines 9 and 10, to insert the following:“Amendment of section 21 of Principal Act
6. To insert a new subsection after subsection (1) of section 21 of the Principal Act:

“(2) To analyse and review the health insurance contracts which are offered by the various health insurance undertakings to ensure than there exists no anti-competitive behaviour in the market place, and to notify the Minister, and the Competition Authority, if they form the opinion that any such, or any other cartel-like behaviours are likely to be present in the health insurance contract market.”.”.

I must admit I am enjoying having a lot of quality time with the Leas-Chathaoirleach this afternoon.
This amendment is born out of personal experience. In comparatively recent history, I approached a company concerning treatment for a patient and was told it was waiting to see what a rival company was doing. I will not be specific and I believe this matter is probably in the realm of sloppiness rather than malfeasance. I actually used the "C" word when I spoke to the company representatives in that I said it sounded like a cartel to me and that it struck me as intrinsically anti-competitive if the company was deciding whether it would make a potentially expensive service available to one of its customers or members depending on whether a potential rival organisation would do so. It struck me also that there is a little trend for this to happen sometimes across the various strands of our relatively small private health insurance market. By introducing this amendment, we are hoping to ensure scrutiny so this behaviour cannot happen.