Andrew Doyle (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I congratulate Deputies Coveney and Enright on bringing forward this motion on energy poverty and for calling on the Government to develop and publish a national strategy to address energy poverty with a specific focus on conservation, pricing and income support and with a targeted approach and a timeframe for delivery. The Fine Gael motion also calls for a consideration of initiatives around energy security, energy policies and for the Government to deal with the immediate problem. We are often told we are robbing Peter to pay Paul. The ESB receives a windfall tax. Approximately 450,000 households are experiencing some level of fuel and energy deprivation. There is a simple and direct way to deal with the immediate and long-term problem but the Government amendment to the motion proposes to deal with the long-term problem and as a consequence, with fuel poverty for the people who are poor. This is a joke. The Government amendment refers to housing adaptation grants and the warmer homes schemes.

Wicklow County Council needed to ask for approval for an overdraft facility to fund the disabled person's grants and housing adaptation grants schemes to which it was committed in the hope it would receive an allocation for 2009. The 2009 scheme will be virtually nil because the money has already been allocated to the 2008 commitments. The housing adaptation grants could achieve something but they are being shelved.

I was told last Thursday that the foreshore licensing Bill would come before the House in 2009. This Bill needs to come before the House in early 2009 so that responsibility can transfer from the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food to the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. The delay seems to be with the division of responsibilities between the Departments. Even with these laudable and admirable proposals for energy security and renewable energy from the Government, it is alleged that €16 billion worth of renewable energy projects are held up in the bottleneck because they cannot access the grid, or so we were informed at another meeting here a couple of weeks ago. These proposals are great on paper but there is no specific plan. The transfer of ESB's assets to EirGrid is in the pipeline; everything is in the pipeline.

Today is 1 October and there is no point in talking about this next April because it will be too late. Statistics speak for themselves. The accident and emergency departments will be overloaded with people. Food and fuel are both dearer this year. It makes sense from a cost-effective point of view to put money into keeping people warm so that they are not turning up at accident and emergency departments.

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