Ms Aoife MacEvilly:

We will endeavour to answer the Deputy's questions. The Deputy should forward any further question. Understanding more about data centre demand is something that we ourselves also want to put some effort into and we are happy to engage with her on that.

In terms of winter protections, I agree with the Deputy that it is just one small part of what needs to be done to support customers. On its own it might be beneficial but we also need to consider the wider suite of social welfare and other Government supports that will be needed to assist customers in very difficult circumstances this winter.

The Deputy has raised some really good points about the different definitions and I will step through them. First, the most critical group is the vulnerable customers who are reliant on medically assistive devices whether it is assistive living, oxygen condensers or other medical devices. Those customers can never be disconnected for reasons of non-payment. We need to get that message out there because people should absolutely not avoid using assistive technology in their homes because they are afraid of their bill. We need more of those customers registered as vulnerable customers and that is one of the targets of our information campaigns. That is a really important protection and we do not think that enough people are aware of it. Maybe the people who are in those situations might not think of themselves as that vulnerable but their family members might recognise that these are people who would benefit from that protection and should be registered.

As the Deputy correctly pointed out, the next level of vulnerability are those who, because of reasons of age or health, might be particularly vulnerable to disconnection during the winter. What we have done for those people is extend the definition of winter as far as it can go. Can Ms Trant confirm whether it is from October to March?