Shay Brennan urges Alliance action on insurers and court costs

Yeah, thanks, Chair. That's what Deputy Timmons was saying there. I don't think we should shy away from that collaboration question. I know we don't have privilege. More terms of our privilege in all those things. Yeah, and I understand that. But there aren't many explanations that make all this tally, but look, if we can't go into it, we can't go into it. It's a small market and, you know, I guess people know each other. But, again, nothing's been proven, so... You can explore the idea of it, just can't mention any names. Is that okay? Yeah, okay. Look, I'll move on to my questions. You can explore the idea, yeah. No, that's fair, that's fair. So, two things, I guess, just in relation to the Alliance itself and maybe where the Alliance is a major body with close to a million members by the looks of things, by the statistics you gave us at the outset. It would seem to me that there's scope for the Alliance to actually do certain things here as well. One would be something along the lines of communication around the IRB and the need to try and avoid courts where possible and certainly stressing that the outcome from the courts is generally no greater and ultimately more costly. Because, obviously, many of the members of your organisation are the same people who are taking court cases. So, I think the scope there. The second would be in relation to, I suppose, just the sheer volume, the power that you might have in numbers. Have you ever considered anything along the lines of one big switch or something to that effect, you know, where your members get together and threaten the insurance companies to walk across the street to another one if proper premiums, more appropriate premiums, aren't actually provided? And maybe even an extension of that, and it's probably taking it too far, but, you know, in certain industries, there might be scope for the industry itself to set up a kind of reinsuring body. And I'm thinking of Senator Nelson Murray talking about Polly and the fact that, you know, they got together and they pay a million a year in premiums. You know, I think there's more scope to do things like that. It's not the answer, you know, but it could be part of the answer coming from the actual consumer side. And then just two other questions. One is just about the 20% that can only get one quote. That's actually quite concerning. And I'm wondering if you have any insights. I know that was just as a result of your survey. If you have any insights to any formal kind of statistics that have been drawn up in that space, or if you have any insights into what direction that is going in, previously being 20%, was that 10% or was that 40%? Is that improving or disimproving? And very finally, I just noted something where you were talking about in relation to personal injury guidelines. And you saw a role for this committee in signing off on the recommendations. Would be interesting now that you're here just to get you to expand on that a little bit. Yeah, well, I'll just take the last part. I'd like there to be a collaboration of both finance and justice because we saw just how close we went on this most recent occasion where it seemed very clear that the minister was of a mind to accept. And not only was he of a mind to accept, but there were at least five instances where judges awarded additional 17% and 18% extra in awards in anticipation of something coming through. I think that it's very clear that the original judgment, it was by the courts, said that the Oireachtas should be in charge of determining or accepting the Judicial Council guidelines. And the Oireachtas, as you know, I'm not educating you, it is more than the government. It is the Houses. And I think that the committees of the House or some of the committees of the House should actually debate the recommendations the next time that it's coming around rather than it being done in one department, Department of Justice or with the assistance of the Department of Justice. I think that democracy is best upheld by being transparent and open, as in these committee rooms. And that's what I was talking about. I'd leave you talk on the other matters, but certainly I believe that the committees, both this committee and justice, should actually decide those, or at least make recommendations, they can't decide, but make recommendations based upon having a full hearing of the matter and all the stakeholders present. And just, Deputy, if I might take up your point about having one underwriter, that has, to be fair, that has come down. There were more sectors five years ago that had only one underwriter or indeed couldn't get any access to cover at all. And the officials of the Department of Finance and the insurance section certainly were working with some of those sectors and there has been progress. However, it's still a significant number, 20%, a lot of them in the tourism and arts and so on, maybe tour operators, historic houses, all sorts of areas you might think of that. And it's a perilous place to be because it's an existential issue. I mean, and I certainly know, I think in one tourism representative body telling me a time when they were just told that in three months' time, yeah, we're pulling out of the sector and there is nobody else. And so, thankfully, that insurer stayed on or a new one was found. But there's a lot of livelihoods wrapped up in something when it's that perilous. And that's, they're the stakes in terms of competition. It's not just about premiums. It's ultimately about livelihoods as well and local communities that those jobs support as well. So I think absolutely we need to, while good work, to be fair, has been done in reducing the number of sectors that can't get cover. The issue, I suppose, for many now is access to affordable cover. And that's really where the challenge lies. But there are, thatch cottages are in an invidious position. Some of the arts really have huge difficulties tour operators. Some of those in the tourism space have either one underwriter or none at all. And that's probably about it. Can I just probe just a, I'll be very quick in relation to that. Both are very brief, just for fairness. You're effectively, when you've won underwriter, you're effectively, they're a monopoly, essentially. Now, is there any evidence that that additional supernormal profits have been made in that area where there's only one underwriter, above and beyond the industry in general? There's no data that I'm aware of that I have seen there, that there's been any comparative analysis done, not that it might not be worthwhile. It may be buried within, assuming that it's a company that provides a number of different styles of cover, it's buried within their overall annual. So you wouldn't see a patched element as being powered out. Okay, thank you.