Insurers urged to cut premiums

The Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, called on motor insurers to "open their books" and show how much they have saved on accident claims since the introduction of the penalty points system for drivers.

The companies have saved "hundreds of millions of euros" in claims since the system was introduced last November, the Minister said yesterday. Mr Brennan was responding to the latest criticism of penalty points enforcement by the Irish Insurance Federation and its warning that car insurance premiums would not be reduced if the current trend in road deaths continued.

The Minister said he was asking insurance companies "once again" to support the system by giving specific reductions to drivers who adhered to traffic regulations.

"One company has done it so far. I would ask the others to do it. This is not the time to give up on the road safety campaign. If the gardaí, insurance companies, the Government and motorists put their backs into this system, it will work."

Mr Brennan acknowledged that enforcement remained an issue, but said insurance companies had their part to play.

"It would be better for the insurance companies to be behind a system that can and will save lives, than to be hanging back and waiting to see how much they will make by the reduction and then try to redistribute it.

"I know they have a business to run, but I also know that their claims are down substantially since penalty points came in. The companies that haven't come forward should do so."

The Minister said he was very conscious of the recent statistics for May and June which showed that road deaths had risen over the same period last year and said he wished to extend his deepest sympathies to those families who had been bereaved.

"The penalty points system is having an effect, it is saving lives - 50 lives have been saved since its introduction and this time next year it will be another substantial number."

However, he was particularly concerned about the deaths of motorcyclists. "Seventy per cent of motorbike riders have no full licence and I do mean to put a stop to that as quickly as I possibly can. There are legal issues I have to deal with.

"It is a constant daily battle to make the system work, but 50 people is a lot of people and 20 per cent fewer people have been injured. If you didn't have the penalty points system, what would the numbers be?"

Mr Brennan said he had met the Minister for Justice, Mr McDowell, recently about the special Garda traffic corps. "We are working to do that, perhaps in the Dublin area to start with. But at 3 a.m., 4 a.m., when people get killed in road accidents, you just can't have a police person on every one of those roads."

There were problems with forming a dedicated traffic corps, he said. "If you have a dedicated traffic corps, you have to make sure that the rest of the gardaí also see it as their business to implement traffic legislation. No matter how big a specialised corps is, you can't cover the whole country.

"What we can do and we have agreement on is privatising speed cameras over the next few months and increasing three cameras nationally to over 50 and placing them in blackspots." This initiative, and random testing for alcohol, would also help to bring about a culture change.

Conor Lally adds: A spokesman for the Irish Insurance Federation last night said while the frequency of claims had reduced under penalty points, three of the last six months were "as bad or worse for road deaths as last year".

"A sustained reduction in insurance premiums can only be achieved if there is a sustained improvement in driver behaviour and we are concerned that that may not happen," he said. "We can only pass on savings that we ourselves achieve."