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Enterprise Committee calls on Regulator to allow Quinn Insurance to participate in all profitable sections of the UK market
By Finfacts Team
Apr 29, 2010 - 3:55:33 PM
Following its meeting with representatives from Quinn Insurance, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment has agreed to call on the Financial Regulator to allow Quinn Insurance Limited immediate access to participate again in all of the profitable sections of the UK insurance market in the Northern Ireland and in Britain.
At its meeting today, the Committee considered the topic ‘The Current Threat to the Jobs of Employees in Quinn Insurance Limited’ with representatives of the Employee Action Committee in Quinn Insurance Limited. The Quinn employees briefed the Committee on the current situation at the insurance company and said the business was losing 2,000 customers a day as a result of the ban on the sale of insurance in the British market and that this was putting jobs at risk.
Chairman of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Willie Penrose, TD, said: “The Committee will ask the Financial Regulator to allow Quinn Insurance access to profitable sections of its business in Northern Ireland the UK.”
Of course it's hard to teach old dogs new tricks and the political interference implied by the statement of the Committee, is an echo of what passed for regulation recently and is directly linked with the banking crash.
The Committee issued a statement without making any case for its plea and it implies the Regulator made a wrong decision.
Workers’ representatives from Quinn Insurance today expressed anger that media reports suggest up to 800 staff may be made redundant as part of a restructuring plan to address the company’s insolvency issues.
The joint administrators appointed to the insurer last month are expected to brief staff on details of their plan on Friday which could see up to a third of staff, mainly in the Republic, lose their jobs.
The Oireachtas Committee was told that the the redundancies were “completely unnecessary” as the company’s core business remained profitable.
In a joint address, they said the insurer was losing up to 2,000 customers a day because of the restrictions imposed by the financial regulator on its ability to write and renew business in Northern Ireland and Britain. The insurer was being forced to turn away business which could help save jobs, they said.
“This situation is causing great anxiety and frustration to the employees who are on the coal face advising new and existing customers that we cannot take their business.”
If the situation was allowed to continue, they warned, the company’s customer base in the UK would be “completely eradicated” within 12 months.
Last week the Regulator lifted the restriction on accepting new business for provisional drivers in the UK, which represents about 10 per cent of its business there. Staff claim that Quinn is losing €1.5 million a day because of the regulator’s decision.
