I welcome news this week that some Insurance companies and brokers have been raided amid allegations of anti-competitive practices in relation to the haulage industry in particular. This is an issue that I have raised on a consistent basis since I was elected and I will be very interested to see what the outcome of these investigations will be.
The haulage industry have been especially singled out with huge increases in premiums over the past three or four years. I know of haulers whose premiums jumped from 20,000 Euro to 35,000 Euro in one year alone. Many small operators are already struggling to survive and these huge increases are putting them at risk of going out of business altogether. It is also very frustrating for these companies when they realise that insurance premiums in countries like Bulgaria are a fraction of what they are in Ireland.
I understand that claims are rising but there is no justification at all for the massive increases that we have seen and hopefully these investigations will bear fruit on behalf of hauliers and other businesses operators. I will be following this matter up as it is one of the issues that is brought up most often when talking to business owners and hauliers.
