Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 4:

In page 12, lines 1 and 2, to delete “1 December 2022 and ending on 30 June 2023” and substitute “1 July 2022 and ending on 31 December 2024”.

The most egregious part of this legislation is that it is constrained to that period of 1 December 2022 until 30 June 2023. It is just that seven-month period when we have all seen the graph of wholesale gas and electricity prices and the massive spike or bonanza in profits for renewables companies, in particular, that happened at the back end of last summer. Other countries have extended such schemes further back retrospectively. This is already a retrospective measure given the fact that the period up to 30 June has passed. I am proposing to capture those super excess profits from last summer and that the scheme be extended back to 1 July 2022 and extended at the other end, although we are less concerned about that, to 31 December 2024, as other countries have done.