Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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We have one of the most successful retrofitting programmes in Europe. I was in Brussels some weeks ago and the association looking at energy efficiency in homes said that we have the highest per capita retrofitting of any European country. I do not know that but I take the person at their word. It was very encouraging because it is working. There will be 52,000 SEAI-supported home energy upgrades this year. That is phenomenal. Had we said that ten or six years ago, people would have doubted it. Almost 21,000 will be to B2. Now, we need to go up. To meet our 2030 targets that needs to be in the order of 70,000 but I contend that as neighbours see their neighbours houses improving, that will further encourage people to have it done. In particular, the low-cost home energy loans, which only now are starting to come in, are allowing those who previously could not avail of the grants to do so.

The Deputy’s figures are broadly correct. The one-stop-shop scheme tends to be more expensive or a bigger investment. Typically, the average grant element of that is €22,500. I have high figures of what the average cost is for private homes. The figures I have are some €63,000 so it is roughly one third grant and two thirds paid for by the householder. I do not believe that is price fixing or gouging because it is a very competitive market.. I think we have 18 one-stop-shops or more. I think it is 20 now and it continues to grow and people can shop around. They are all for deeper retrofit. That is the benefit of the one-stop-shop.