Brian Stanley on 9–13% energy hikes and demand for €400 credit

and I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important issue. Minister, we are facing into the dark, cold months of winter and we are facing into it in the context of families and households and workers being hit with increased local property tax, increasing fuel costs for transport, student fees, insurance, rent, food and the list goes on. And now we are facing into a situation in the last week where four energy companies are hiking up their prices. Prices used to go up in energy by one or two or three percent. Most of us remember that. But now it is 9, 11, 12 and 13 percent and so on. That is the way it goes. Energy is going to put their prices by 12 percent. Borogash has gone up by 13 percent. Pin Energy is putting up prices by 9 percent. We have one of the highest electricity prices in Europe. Over half a million customers are going to be hit with these increases in the next couple of weeks. Many of them do not have the additional amounts of money to pay for that. Already we have a record number of people in arrears and we are only in September. They are still getting some more bills. This is the important issue. The government has decided to withdraw energy credits and energy support in the upcoming budget. Yet he had no problem giving them last year. Millionaires got him. All of us in this house got him. It was absolute insanity. It is simple what you are doing. I cannot but reach the conclusion that you were trying to buy the election. Helicopter money was falling out of the sky into households. But this year low-paid workers, families, disabled people such as my colleague here Deputy Healey has mentioned, disabled people, elderly, but low-paid workers who do not get any fuel scheme or anything else, they need help. It is the government's job to try and protect people. Energy companies are price gouging and we know that because of the huge amount of profits they are making. With the highest electricity, one of the highest in the European Union, yet wholesale prices for electricity have dropped by over 70% in the last three years, while the cost continues to increase. It is pure profiteering and over 300,000 households cannot pay those bills already. The government are also committed to increasing carbon tax to heap on more costs on people. Minister, the public service obligation levy, this must be restructured. At the moment, the public are subsidising large companies, they are subsidising energy to data centres. Data centres must start paying their fair share and carry the burden for their responsibilities, not domestic customers. The current PSO levy at 323 per month plus VAT, that needs to be restructured. It changes again at the end of September and it is time to reform that. I want to address the issue of support for wind farmers. I am a supporter of wind energy, I am a supporter of solar energy, biogas energy, hydrogen energy and hydro energy. We need to use all of the renewable sources we have. I get that. But what I want to say to you is this. According to an answer to a parliamentary question that I got recently, over the last five years, you have given 549 million to private developers, developing wind farms. Now there were some years there was a negative, but I worked out the figures, the balance works out at a plus of 549 million. Those companies are highly profitable. We were told that when we had wind energy and renewable energy that it would be a lot cheaper, in particularly wind energy. But that has not turned out to be the case. It has turned out to be very, very expensive. And you are allowing those companies to price gouge. You are also providing support for them to get set up and to do it. But the cost of energy which we promised would go down with wind energy is skyrocketing. And government need to explain that. Now a previous speaker referred to a very important matter. Who owns it? You know, if I heard the previous speaker correctly, and I think he quoted correctly, that over 90 per cent used to be owned by the public. Now that is nearly flipped on its head. 75 per cent is owned by them. Them being large corporations that we have no control over. And you have no control over because you have allowed this to happen deliberately. Laissez-faire policies, laissez-faire liberal economics, you know, real Trumpian style of stuff. And you might give up about Trump and all that, but you are copying what he is doing economically. And you are handing over key industries, key industries, to these large companies who are taking you on a merry dance and absolutely ripping off the taxpayer. A few years ago, you know, going back a number of decades ago, you know, people would be reasonably well off if they had a car, if they could afford one holiday a year and such and such. People now can't put bread on the table. I have outlined to you seven or eight increases at the start when I was speaking in relation to seven or eight increases that are coming in. The fuel allowance kicks in this week. That is welcome. I welcome that matter. But it needs to be expanded and it needs to be targeted better. We must make sure that people have help and that we help those who are most needed in the upcoming budget. There must be at least 400 euros of an energy credit this year to assist people. If energy prices are allowed to continue rising before the budget, what will it be like after the budget, when the government heaps on their extra costs and the knock-on prices? You know, people are saying to me they are really, really struggling, struggling with supermarket prices and all of the other things that I outlined. You are leading people into debt. You are leaving it to St Vincent de Paul and charities to sort out this. You know, the Salvation Army, St Vincent de Paul, you know, whoever can, load it onto charities and, you know, thank them for the work. That is not good enough. We need a more sustainable way of dealing with this. And just in relation to retrofitting, retrofitting has been welcomed and I welcome the fact that it is happening. But it needs to happen quicker and some of the schemes need to be changed because the upfront costs for people are just too high. Most middle and low-income workers cannot come up with 25, 30 or 35,000 to pay their part of it. They cannot take out an extra loan on top of a mortgage that they have because it is just not possible for them to do that. So we need to examine that and we need to help that better. And it would appeal to you to do something with that in the budget. We also need to ensure that when retrofitting, that we include windows, windows and doors in it because if we do not, you know, a lot of the heat is flying out through the windows and doors and it is not being contained within the house. And particularly for those low-income households who are not in the social housing category, people who are living in private houses, you know, who are cash poor. They are cash poor. They may own the house but they do not have the money to retrofit. So look, we are facing into the dark-cold winter evenings. Householders and particularly the low-paid, the disabled and other groups need help. I am appealing to you, don't let the budget pass. Don't pass them over in the budget. I know there is no election and you don't have to buy an election this year, but I would ask you not to forget those people. Thank you Deputy Senator