Written answers

Tuesday, 29 May 2018

Department of Finance

Motor Insurance Claims

Photo of John CurranJohn Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail)
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208. To ask the Minister for Finance if he will report on the progress made to date in the establishment of a national claims information database; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23709/18]

Photo of Paschal DonohoePaschal 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.  The Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform and the Taoiseach indicated to me in February that it would not be conducting pre-legislative scrutiny on the Bill. 

The Office of the Parliamentary Counsel assigned a drafter to the Bill on 26 January 2018 and officials in the Department of Finance are currently working with the drafter to finalise a draft of the Bill as soon as possible.  I understand that good progress has been made and I am hopeful that a Bill will be published before the end of this legislative Session. 

I also launched a public consultation on the General Scheme which concluded in March and the responses received were published on my Departments website: .A number of responses were received from industry and business groups.  My officials have been reviewing the content of these responses as they relate to the drafting of the Bill.  As part of the process of finalising the Bill, the Department is assessing the responses with regard to the validity of the concerns expressed against the overall policy aim of the legislation.  On the basis of its review of the responses to date, the Department does not anticipate that substantive amendments will be required at this stage and therefore it is not anticipated to give rise to any delay in the finalisation and publication of the Bill.  A consultation will also have to take place with the European Central Bank on the Bill once it is published. 

As the Deputy will appreciate, 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 specification for the Database.

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