A Tipperary Senator is calling for a debate with the Minister for the Environment to discuss energy costs.
Senator Garrett Ahearn ridiculed the 10% reduction from energy companies in the Seanad Éireann, saying it is nowhere near sufficient during a cost-of-living crisis.
He says that energy companies are making millions of euro in profits off the backs of struggling households and businesses despite wholesale prices returning to pre-war levels.
“A number of government members and Ministers welcomed the announcement by Electric Ireland in reducing costs on energy bills by 10% for businesses. I don’t welcome it at all, to be perfectly honest. For the last year and a bit, every time energy prices went up, they went up by 29%, 30%, and 32%, and the very first time they announced a reduced cost – and they only reduced it on businesses; they actually didn’t reduce it on households at all – they only reduced it by 10%.
“It seems to me that what they’ve done is, they’ve heard the Taoiseach’s comments last week that’s he’s actually going to energy companies to ask them to reduce costs, that it shouldn’t be the onus of the state to always be the fall-back to support people through the energy crisis. These businesses that are making multi-, multi-, multi-million-pound profits, bigger profits they’ve ever made this year than any other year, that they give a measly 10% cut.”
Senator Ahearn says he wants a debate with Minister for the Environment, Eamon Ryan, to seek answers on how this can be resolved as the energy companies make their highest profits ever.
“I really think we need to have a debate in here with the Minister about what he’s going to do to make sure that these companies that are making huge profits on the back of households and businesses struggling just to survive, that they can come out with a measly 10% cut and think that it’s enough, to think that people are fools, that they will just accept that and go, “Brilliant. Sure, there’s a cut.” It is nowhere near what it should be.”
