Hoban urges insurer focus on new EU directive

UK insurers need to focus on getting upcoming European legislation right to avoid a repeat of the fiasco surrounding the European Court’s ruling on insurance gender pricing, City minister Mark Hoban has said.

Speaking at an ABI CEOs breakfast meeting this morning, Hoban said the most important issue was to ensure that the forthcoming equalities directive was not open to the same kind of legal challenge that led to the European Court of Justice’s recent ruling.

It ruled that insurers can no longer discriminate on gender grounds when pricing insurance contacts.

“We need to get the directive rather than leave it to review in a court”, he said.

But he said that across the EU, there was little chance of unpicking the gender directive.

“This (ruling) is not a great outcome, but frankly there is not much appetite for going down this route.”

Speaking to Insurance Times afterwards, Hoban said that the government was still examining the “practical details” of the ruling. “This is a work progress,” he said.

Keith Morris, chairman of motor specialist Sabre, said that insurers had presented the court with evidence of the ruling’s detrimental impact until they were “blue in the face.”

“The Advocate-General and the courts were looking at purely legalistic arguments,” he said.

“Certain firms may withdraw from this sector of the market as a result of the ruling.”

Hiscox chief executive Bronek Masoada called for top level representation for the insurance industry in the new Prudential Regulatory Authority.