Business leaders have said they are “absolutely” supportive of efforts by the Government to rebalance the “duty of care” imposed by property owners under occupiers and civil liability acts.
Minister for Justice Helen McEntee has revealed a Government subcommittee is examining how compensation for injuries is handled in other countries, with a view to presenting new options here, possibly as soon as the end of the year.
The industry body Insurance Ireland, employers group Isme and individual business owners such as Pat McDonogh of Supermac’s have all expressed concern about how the burden of responsibility is applied to premises owners, and the size of awards made by the courts in civil injuries cases.
Isme chief executive Neil McDonnell said he was “absolutely supportive” of efforts to rebalance the responsibility for slips and trips, saying “even if there was an 80 per cent reduction” in awards it would not get owners out of their predicament. He said the insurance industry and legal profession were fond of blaming each other for the situation, but in truth “if there was half a billion euro in awards made this year the insurance industry would just add 10 per cent and pass the costs on to their customers”.
He described the relationship between insurers and lawyers as “symbiotic”.
Mr McDonnell said that following the introduction of the Personal Injuries Assessment Board (PIAB) in 2003 there had been a 40 per cent drop in the number of claims, but numbers had been increasing again, particularly since the economic crash in 2008.
He said many small business owners did not feel their advocates were always on their side. “We have member companies whose insurance is in the region of six figures a year, it is like a mortgage they have to clear that before they make any profit. You don’t find that level of burden in any other country in Europe,” he said.
Fees
Mr McDonogh said he always contested claims where he thought claimants were being dishonest and were seeking easy money. He also criticised the insurance and legal professions saying that the main thing on the lawyers’ agenda was “who is going to pay their fees”.
He said the current system was unsatisfactory in a number of areas from the level of awards made to those taking cases; differing dispositions among judges; court rules; and costs. He said frequently it was obvious that plaintiffs did not have the resources to sustain an award of costs against them, and for that reason alone costs were awarded against those perceived as most able to pay.
Mr McDonogh said experience had shown that recessions increased the number of claims against businesses as people became more anxious for money and he said the current recession due to Covid-19 would see “more of these” in the years ahead.
Insurance Ireland said it “strongly supports” reform.
“Legal costs in personal injuries claims that are taken to court are nearly 20 times higher than those where cases are dealt with by PIAB,” it said. It added that it also strongly supported “further strengthening and broadening of the legal powers of PIAB in line with the work programme of the Government’s Cabinet committee subgroup on insurance reform.
Last week, Ms McEntee said the programme for government contained a commitment to consider changed to the Occupiers’ Liability Act and the Civil Liability Act to strengthen waivers and notices in order to increase protections for consumers, businesses, sporting clubs and community groups. She said international practice was being examined “with a view to presenting possible options by the end of the year”.
Tánaiste Leo Varadkar, who chairs the Cabinet subgroup on insurance reform, said changes to the PIAB regulations were also on the agenda.
