These wet days have found the FERMA office team busy with plans, for the board meeting and general assembly in June and then, of course, for the seminar in October. The 2012 benchmarking survey is well underway. Our social media presence is expanding and we now have more than 700 twitter followers.

Florence Bindelle, Executive Manager

The passage of European legislation is not fast moving – but at the same time it requires consistent attention to get the views of FERMA’s members to the right people at the right time.
For example, we are waiting for the results of interviews that Ernst & Young are currently conducting on behalf of the European Commission on reinsurance pools and the subscription market. This is part of the Commission’s review of the insurance block exemption regulation (BER), the current version of which is not due to expire until 2017.
More advanced in its progress is the revised Insurance Mediation Directive (IMD) where we are working on a position paper, since the evidence so far is that the Commission does not want to have large risks or professional insurance buyers covered by its provisions.

We also attended the seminar organised by the Commission at the end of 2011 on natural catastrophes and responded to the consultation exercise that concluded on 31 May. We are now waiting for the next step. As with the IMD, the Commission’s concern here is primarily with ordinary individuals, but we think commercial insurance buyers should have a voice in the arrangements for financial mitigation of catastrophe losses.

There are many other activities where we believe our members have an important role or should be represented. For example, FERMA is one of the sponsors of the EU Healthy Workplaces Campaign, Europe’s largest occupational health and safety campaign.

I also took part in business community debate on corporate governance at the European Parliament: “Not one size but fits for all”. Our friends at the European Confederation of Institutes of Internal Auditing (ECIIA) were joint organisers of the event.

We are always keen to hear members’ views on these projects. If you would like more information, please contact me.

Florence Bindelle, Executive Manager