Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I commend my colleagues on bringing this motion before the House. I cannot believe I must stand here to try to convince the Government to help people in dire straits. I cannot believe I must explain the hardship that people are living through. I certainly cannot believe, and I will not believe, that the Deputies sitting opposite in the Chamber are unaware of what is happening outside this building. Perhaps the people coming to their offices are not suffering or perhaps they do not know who comes to their office door. I do not believe that either, to be fair.

In the past three weeks, I have had elderly people in my office who cannot afford to buy heating oil so they go to bed once the evening gets cold. I have had parents who had to choose whether to heat or eat; they do without dinner so their children can be fed and warm. I have had people who own older homes and hoped to retrofit as they are terrified they will not be able to heat those homes next winter but they cannot afford the retrofit process. The grants do not come close to covering that cost.

The Minister does not have to take my word for this. Social Justice Ireland, One Family Ireland and Age Action Ireland have been warning the Government about this for months. In rural Ireland there are thousands of people depending on turf and oil as they try to heat their homes. The majority of these people are not in a position to retrofit their homes so to tax them further and offer no other resource or to threaten to criminalise selling a bag of turf is not only cruel but absolutely insane.

We all agree action must be taken against climate change. We all know we are running out of time. This, however, is not the way to do it. Today on "Morning Ireland", Senator Pippa Hackett referred to the "black market" of turf sales. I really wonder what planet she and her colleagues are living on. Have we ever heard the likes of a black market for turf sales? Using this language causes fear and solves nothing. Our constituents need our help in a very difficult time and they do not need to be bullied or reprimanded around turf sales.

I ask the Government to support this motion. In particular, I ask rural Deputies for their support because they know the reality faced by their constituents. I will hold to account the Deputies in south Kildare when I see what they do.

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