Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Having watched television and listened to various politicians speak about the emergency weather conditions in recent days, I was surprised to note that few of them, if any, referred to the Defence Forces. I know that members of the Defence Forces are on duty 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Like many volunteers, they left their families and went outside in difficult conditions.Indeed I had experience over the period, and I thank the Department of Defence and its Minister of State, of a family which was facing a bereavement. The military stood up, collected members of that family and brought them to their dying mother. They are to be commended on that. I wish we would remember every now and then that the men in uniform are there 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They do a damn good job and need to be respected for it.

I want to bring two issues to the attention of the Leader. The first is that I would like to have a debate in the House on bullying in the workplace. It is a serious issue. It is known that I have an interest in this particular area but of late the number of people contacting me on the issue of bullying has been shocking. I wonder why the workplace has become such an unhappy place. I am not sure whether we should be talking to the Minister for Justice and Equality or the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection but we need to have that debate. I will divert to the Leader to choose the correct Minister.

The other issue I wanted to raise relates to an email I received this morning from a young man seeking car insurance. He has a 2006 registered car worth approximately €2,000 and he was quoted €2,600 for an insurance policy on it. I know that the Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, did a lot of work on that issue when he was at the Department of Finance. Do we have an update on where it is going? The young people of this country are being ripped off left, right and centre while insurance companies are paying dividends. Last week a dividend of 34 cent on the share was paid to shareholders in FBD Insurance. I think it was 34 cent. It is amazing that FBD can pay dividends to shareholders but cannot provide reasonably priced insurance. The price of insurance for that young man is more than the value of the car. All he wants to do is to be legal on the road. We need to have an update from the Department of Finance on that issue. If the Leader had one, it would be very helpful. I expect him to deal with that in his own time.