Insurance Industry
Dail Éireann — 2026-05-26
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Pearse Doherty (SF), Donegal

Does the Minister of State not accept the average cost for motor insurance in this State is now €655? Does he accept that insurance companies are paying out less than half of that in claims? Does he accept that insurance companies are taking more in profits and inflated costs that they are paying out? They are all facts. Insurance companies are squeezing people dry to appease their shareholders. The Government wants to blame drivers. This Government is going along with that. The transparency code refers to risk mitigation and driver behaviour more than profit or inflated costs.
I tabled proposed legislation four years ago in the House to set out how a Government could mandate insurance companies to show how they are actually passing on the benefits of these reforms to customers and not profiteering from those same reforms. Instead, we get a voluntary code with no audits or enforcement. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael and the Independents that support them are blocking my Bill. The public deserves to have full transparency. They deserve not just transparency and accountability, but also reduced premiums, as was promised by these reforms. Unfortunately, if we do not have a Government that stands up to the industry, the industry will of course deepen its pockets with profits.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-05-26/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:04+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-26