Mr. Leo Clancy:

Energy is having a significant impact on business, as it is across the entire economy. It is fortunately less bad than it might have been. If we look back to last August and September there were fears that energy prices might prove catastrophic for businesses during the winter. That has not been the case. Yesterday I met a client who is in an energy susceptible business, who said their wholesale energy prices are now in the early 20s, versus a normal level of the mid teens over a year ago. It is less bad than we might have worried about with regard to the energy costs to business. As the Deputy knows, we launched the Ukraine enterprise crisis scheme with our parent Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment to respond directly to the energy crisis. The take-up on that has been relatively low. We relaunched it this week, and went out with a revised scheme, which allows businesses a slightly lower bar in terms of access. Overall, the impact on business has been much lower than might have been feared with regard to energy prices but it remains a significant risk.