Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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125. To ask the Minister for Finance when he expects the national claims information database to be fully up and running; when he expects enacting legislation to be brought forward and passed; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13643/18]

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
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The development of the National Claims Information Database is a complex project as insurers very often record data in different ways and do not necessarily use the same definitions.

For this reason, my officials established a data sub-group in 2017, which has been meeting since then to examine the issues regarding its development and to prepare the General Scheme of the legislation required. At the end of 2017, it completed its work on the development of this Scheme and on 19 December 2017, the Government approved the General Scheme of the Central Bank (National Claims Information Database) Bill.

The Bill is included in the Government Legislative Programme on the list of Priority Legislation for publication this session. It was submitted to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform and the Taoiseach for pre-legislative scrutiny, and that Committee contacted me in February to indicate that it would not be conducting any further scrutiny on the Bill. It should also be noted that the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel assigned a drafter to the Bill on 26 January 2017 and officials in my Department are currently working with the drafter to finalise a draft of the Bill as soon as possible. A consultation will also have to take place with the European Central Bank on the Bill once it is published.

As the Deputy will be aware, it will take a certain amount of time following publication of the Bill, for it to pass through the Houses of the Oireachtas however I am hopeful that with the cooperation of all parties in the Houses, the Bill can be considered and approved expeditiously.

To ensure that the Database can be operationalised quickly following the enactment of the legislation, the Central Bank has continued to work in parallel on the technical specifications for the Database and recently held a series of meetings with the insurance sector as part of its consultations with the sector on developing these specifications.