Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister knows very well, because we do it every year, but he will try to scaremonger anyway, that there are other ways to raise taxes, routes the Minister will decide not to go down for his own reason. We want to see more retrofits. We do not believe in the Green Party's solution where a person on a middle income must have 50% of the funding to have a deep retrofit in their house. It is unaffordable for people. It is great when Deputy Matthews talks about 100% grants, but a person would have to wait 27 months to get it. That is the problem. I understand the Green Party has only been in Government for the guts of three years, but if a person applies for that grant today it will be 2025 and 2026 before the person can actually get it. I imagine the Green Party would be long out of Government by that stage.

In his reply, the Minister talked about the challenges in building up capacity. One could swear that the Minister had just landed around the Cabinet table last month. He has been there for years. In 2015, there were 30,000 retrofits for roof insulation and 30,000 for wall insulation. In 2020, that has been brought to about 7,000 for each. Some 40,000 fewer of those types of insulations are taking place. That is under the Minister's watch. I am aware we cannot sort out these homes overnight, and obviously we must deal with the mess the Government has done. This is why we argue for a change in terms of the proportion of the funding and increased expenditure for retrofit that comes from other sources and not from increases in carbon tax. There is a core issue. Maybe the Government will come together and say we should just send them blankets this winter. These houses have not had the retrofits they needed over the period the Minister has been in government, and many of these houses are heated with home heating oil.

Under this Government, the price of home heating oil for the houses in question has increased through direct taxation and, even more so, as a result of factors relating to geopolitical issues. We need to respond to that. We will vote in the next few minutes, and the Minister will vote to do nothing about the price of home heating oil. I do not think that is appropriate. There needs to be a one-off, targeted, time-bound intervention in this regard. That would be that sensible solution. We had to engage in a bit of cajoling and pushing in respect of the Minister when, time and again, we raised with him the need to do something about petrol and diesel. He bought into that. As is the case in respect of many issues, it takes a great deal of campaigning to force the Minister to see the light. He has abandoned all of the homes to which I refer, particularly those in rural communities. A third of all homes in the State, including two thirds of homes in the west and north west, will have to be heated using home heating oil this winter. We have the ability to do something about them here, but the Minister has decided not to do anything. That is wrong.

The best way to deal with this is, as Deputy Matthews said, by making sure that we have a fit-for-purpose system that allows for retrofitting, including shallow and deep retrofitting, that is affordable, accessible and available to as many homes as possible. That means ramping up. We are at a fraction of the level we were at in 2011 and 2015. The Government has allowed this to fall to the wayside. The Government sat around the Cabinet table and not one Minister thought that maybe we should think about environmental matters or training people to do deep retrofitting. In 2011, between roof insulation and cavity insulation, 100,000 properties were retrofitted. By 2013, that had dropped to approximately 30,000. Not a single Minister has put a plan in place, which is why people have been waiting for 27 months in respect of applications. We cannot sort that out today. It will take time. The Minister is right about the skills required. Deputy Matthews talked about encouraging people to apply. There are 9,000 people in the warmer homes scheme. They cannot get the work done. There is significant demand in respect of that scheme.

We need to deal with the winter now. There is an option to reduce the cost of home heating oil over the winter months. I have argued strongly that this should happen. I have focused on that point, but there are also arguments about petrol and diesel.