Denis Landy (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I second the motion.

I am old enough to remember the ambulance chasing that went on in the 1980s and 1990s, and the State's consideration of the situation pertaining to claims against it. It was against that backdrop that the State Claims Agency was established in 2000 under the National Treasury Management Agency, NTMA. The purpose set out then was: to manage personal injury, property damage, and clinical negligence claims; provide risk management services on the State's behalf and minimise its exposure; and deal with third-party costs in certain tribunals.

The State Claims Agency is answerable to the Committee of Public Accounts and the Attorney General. In its 2014 annual report, it states that it "acts in the best interest of taxpayers" in minimising claims exposures. It also states that it seeks "to act ethically and fairly in its dealings with people who have suffered injuries and take legal action against the State", and that it resolves, by negotiation and mediation, all but 3% of the cases it deals with. As stated by Senator Whelan, there are 129 public bodies within the remit of the SCA. Currently, the agency employs 91 staff. So far so good, but in the next section of the report we discover there are no figures available for the amounts paid to firms or individuals that provide services to the SCA. They are exempt under freedom of information. We also discover that there is an additional 50% in costs, on top of the cost of the payouts, charged on an annual basis.

The general claims liability in 2014 was €309 million, and clinical liability was €1.16 billion. "Clinical" refers to maternity services, medicine, surgery, gynaecology and radiology. What is the issue? As Senator Whelan has outlined very articulately, there is unnecessary time wasting. Individuals, families, and, indeed, the families of deceased people have been dragged - for ten years in some cases - through processes that are eventually settled either on the steps of the court or in court. This has caused destruction to the lives of these people. It is David versus Goliath.

The SCA acts on behalf of the State but, as we know, the public rightly sees the State through its legislators - us, the people in this room and those in the Lower House. I have often watched the six o'clock news and seen the situation outside the Four Courts, when young children were brought out in wheelchairs with their parents and solicitors. It was the State that put them through that trauma. That State, in the eyes of the public, is us.

It is time to stop this. The system that is in place may have dealt with a particular issue that occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, but it now needs to be reformed. It is no longer good enough to say we have to go through a process or that the law will take its course. In most cases, the claims are uncontested but still the families are required to undergo a process that can last ten, 12 or 15 years. Parents who are unfortunate enough to have a child born with some difficulty as a result of medical negligence should not have to wait until the child is a teenager to get on with their lives. It should be dealt with immediately, in good time and properly. Negligence is accepted in most of these cases, yet lives are practically ruined and destroyed for ever.

As legislators we need to start the process of reform of the State Claims Agency. We need to bring in the people who are working with it as well as representatives from the Department of Finance, which is the responsible Department, to see how we can do this better. There are people making money out of it. While that is not the sole purpose of what we are doing, the fact that 50% extra on top of the claims is paid out for various costs needs to be looked at and we are responsible. Insurance costs are spiralling and this is part of the reason. As legislators, we are responsible to the taxpayer for the money we are spending. We need to stop, take account of what is going on and start the process of reform.I look forward to the Minister's response. By putting forward the motion today, Senator John Whelan and I have started the process and I hope we can see it through and bring forward a better process and system. The agency does not need to be scrapped, but it does need to be reformed for a better system to be put in place.