Small business political group examines insurance

The All Party Parliamentary Small Business Group (APPSBG) held a packed public meeting at the House of Commons on Tuesday, March 25, 2003, to gather evidence on the growing storm over increased insurance costs for many small UK businesses.

I help the APPSBG run their extranet/intranet as well as provide advice to the Officers of the APPSBG on how to use the internet to consult on key issues “better, faster, cheaper”. This was the first time that an All Party Group had combined a virtual consultation with a conventional “real life” consultation and I attended to witness the proceedings and learn some lessons which will help us prepare the freelancer briefing that will be the next APPSBG key topic.

Insurance premiums

The meeting was held in one of the smaller committee rooms in the House of Commons and was attended by members of the public, trade associations and the press. Members of the APPSBG were seated around the typical committee horseshoe facing the desks where the people giving evidence were seated. The group heard first from those affected by the increased insurance premiums and then secondly by representatives from the insurance industry. Behind them were the members of the public, trade associations and press. The meeting was packed and those arriving late had to stand for the two hours of the proceeding.

The proceedings were chaired by Kerry Pollard MP and when he was called away to vote; Lord Harrison stepped in. I sit with both as main board Directors of the Genesis Initiative and I have found their easy informal style coupled with attention to the need to be succinct, conducive to good meetings.

Other MPs present included Mark Prisk, Henry Bellingham, David Drew, Oliver Heald, Brian Cotter and Mike Weir.

The meeting was also attended by Nigel Griffiths who is the small firms Minister at the DTI; in part underlining that this issue had got his attention and in part recognising the growing influence of the APPSBG, which at 436 members is now the largest group within Parliament.

Ten-fold increase

The meeting opened with Directors of affected businesses giving evidence of the rises in insurance premiums. It was interesting to see that the most effective in getting the attention of the MPs were those who kept it simple, spoke from the heart and told them of their experience, not their opinions on what it meant, but hard won experience. One such person was Mr Griffiths who spoke eloquently and told how his company, Griffiths Scaffolding, had not made any claims, was profitable, well run and yet had seen his premiums jump from £5,000 to £50,000. He said that as this insurance was compulsory, he thought it very bad that the final quote only came through the day of the renewal. This was despite chasing for three months.

The insurance companies then gave evidence. Present were John Parker from the Association of British Insurers; Phil Bell from Royal Sun Alliance and Peter Staddon of the British Insurance Brokers Association.

The reasons for the premium hikes were explained although I thought the fact that John Parker and Phil Bell offered conflicting evidence as to the impact of 9/11 weakened their case. Their approach to last minute quotes came under close scrutiny from the MPs with Mark Prisk in particular probing this point. They accepted they were aware of the problem and were giving “serious consideration” to an industry code of conduct. I sensed that MPs present were not impressed that there was no timescale and that it was not a commitment, but only under consideration.

The meeting closed at 6pm and notes of the meeting will be circulated to the other Members not present.

What does this mean for freelancers?

Liability Insurance is not on the top of our list of problems, so the subject of the meeting may be of little interest.

What is of interest is that we now have a means of accessing a large group of MPs and an accepted forum to make our case. Four years ago when I was originally trying to achieve something against IR35, our lobbyist could not get us in to see a Minister or hold a briefing meeting for any group of MPs, let alone the 436 now represented by APPSBG. In fact, many contractors will remember the way we eventually did engage MPs in direct dialogue was by 700 freelancers turning up at the House of Commons one Wednesday in November to ask to speak to their MPs there and then!

I have persuaded the Group to make ‘freelancers’ the subject of their next enquiry. The next meeting will be to brief this Group on the issues affecting freelancers and I see this as key progress to help make politicians aware of the difference that freelancers make to the UK economy, to their clients and to themselves.

My view is that to really influence Government and to stop them issuing damaging legislation such as IR35 and Section 660, we need to ensure they fully understand the significant contribution freelancers make. This is always hard when engaged on a campaign against a specific issue.

In the coming weeks I will be setting out in more detail how I propose we could do this.