The Minister will be aware of the dramatic reduction in personal injury awards over the past two months by as much as 50%. He will also be aware that that reduction is a result of actions taken by the Government, which took a long time and encountered ferocious opposition. However, insurance premiums have not reduced commensurately. The idea behind bringing down personal awards was that premiums would be reduced and that these savings would be passed on to the consumer. What is the Government's proposal to compel these insurance companies to pass on these savings to the consumer, which has always been the intention?

That is absolutely the intention. The focus on bringing down insurance costs is not just a recent one and did not just come about on the back of that recent legislation. It has been consistently applied across a range of areas. The Minister of State, Deputy Fleming, held a series of meetings with the main insurers in the Irish market in April to discuss the guidelines and the need for insurers to respond by reducing premiums and expanding their product offering. I understand most insurers committed to decreased premiums in response to this development and the Minister of State intends to meet with them again later this year to review progress in this regard.

Critical to this issue is the national claims information database that the Central Bank maintains, which increases transparency in the insurance sector. It contains details of all claim costs, premium prices and claim settlements going back as far as 2009. We should be able to see the impact of the new guidelines-----

Thank you. We are over time. We do not have time for the Minister to read the rest of his response. I call Deputy Andrews.