Mr. Gary Connolly:

I would not characterise it as eagerness. We have been engaging with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage for some time. We have sent periodic letters and members of our association have engaged with it. I understand the next step to be a set of interim regulations involving some easing around much of the country, with an exclusion zone around airports while they do some assessment, and a parallel strategic environmental assessment which is supposed to deliver the final regulations around this. I have heard that the update in that regard is coming in next quarter pretty much since I started this job in January 2021. I am reliably informed that many others have traipsed that road before me. We struggle as an organisation to understand why it has taken so long because we understand a lot of the work has been done. It has been under way for a long time. I think the Deputy is right to frame it in terms of the impact on people. At the domestic level, it is 12 sq. m or 50% of the roof area, which results in people putting in smaller systems than would be optimal in order to fit within the planning. That is happening on firms around the country as well. It is a 50 sq. m rule and it encourages people to go towards a smaller system than would be ideal. That has an impact on people's energy bills, particularly given what we see in the energy markets today and what people are exposed to. The wholesale cost of power is three or four times what it was this time last year. Everyone's bills were raised by suppliers on three to five occasions last year. We are not done yet and there are the knock-on effects of the horrible war in Ukraine. There is an issue of human welfare, in some ways, with the delays in the planning. We want to see those guidelines and the process kicking off. We want to see it ventilated and to see the consultation process begin in order that people can benefit from it.