How Insurance effects Road Safety
In Ireland, our legal requirement to purchase private motor insurance increases the risks some motorists are willing to take on the road by providing a false sense of security which I hope demonstrate further down.
"It'll be alright, at least I'm insured, whats the worst that can happen?" - How many times have we all heard these words or ones just like them from perfectly reasonable people in our lives?
God forbid, should your loved one be killed by an irresponsible driver, what consolation really is it to know they paid for insurance, with no guarantee they we're covered at the time of the accident!
Road safety is not about having the best insurance policy, its about always acting responsibly while driving and paying full attention to car control and road positioning. Under the current system of purely private insurers, racketeering to maintain an artificially high value for their products in a monopoly market, requiring motorists to shell out hundreds and even thousands for basic policies, often costing more than the value of your car, seems to psychologically abdicate the motorist from their personal responsibility to other road users to act responsibly and properly when driving.This abdication results in the motorist feeling a false sense of security possibly encouraging more risky behaviour when driving.
Some might say, at least the bereaved family benefit from the insurance policy of the insured to cover any medical costs or god forbid the funeral costs when in reality we all know this is not the case. The insurance industry prides itself on its powers of litigation in reducing the cost of "fraudulent" claims, while no one would deny fraud exists in claims within the insurance industry its rarely proven and even rarer questioned when in reality what their doing is depriving citizens and motorists of these basic dignities in life. If a driver who killed your loved one tests positive for alcohol or drugs their policy is void, which often happens leaving families to take on debt in the wake of their loved one's death in some cases. To add insult to injury its often the case the aggressor in the incident walks away relatively unscathed with a minor ban.
I would argue that every citizen regardless of circumstances should be entitled to this basic dignity in the wake of such a loss but often denied to many by insurance company litigators. Insurance should not be a industry about profit, its supposed to be a security service providing peace of mind. The kind of security required to provide this peace of mind cannot be provided only by the private market on a profit basis. Universal third party insurance provided on all cars with valid NCT certificates could provide this service while also giving motorists a real incentive to keep their car in excellent road worthy condition. This basic dignity should not be denied to any citizen, much less, the innocent party and if the NCT was a state insurance company providing this peace of mind it would make me feel much safer on Irish roads.