Insurance Industry
Dail Éireann — 2025-12-18
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Pearse Doherty (SF), Donegal

The Minister knows I am raising this because of the invaluable reportage we get from the Central Bank every year that is reported upon and understood by us. It has its own definition of operating profits. When we talk about the operating profits of any company, that means operating profits before tax or interest is deducted. That is the standard definition.
The Central Bank uses its own definition which has under-reported the profits of the insurance industry by not using the standard definition. In the past five years the Central Bank has under-reported operating profits just in the motor sector by €114 million. This is money that is extracted from people to keep their cars on the road. Will the Minister for Finance engage? The Central Bank is transparent. It has its own definition and all the rest. It is not doing anything different there. However, when people see operating profits they think it is the way that it is reported right throughout the world but the Central Bank has used a different definition. Will the Minister engage for the sake of transparency and a common understanding of what profit this industry is making? These profits, which we all thought were very high, are now even higher than what we understood before.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-18/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:29+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-18