Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The European Council again discussed ways to curb energy prices. Gas is now five times the price it was a year ago, which is a threat to households and the wider economy. The impact on small businesses is also ferocious. One of our local shops has been landed with a €4,200 electricity bill. This is despite its operators doing everything possible to reduce it, for example, switching off fridges and lights and taking every measure they can just to stay in business. The nearest shop to that one is 15 miles away. Another supermarket has seen its bills increase from €3,000 to €9,000. I raise this matter because a recently-produced national energy security framework estimates that electricity costs will have increased by between 45% and 60% above 2021 levels later this year. That would mean a €700 increase per household.

The Government is not doing enough to address the crisis. We are sleepwalking towards a winter where people will really struggle. We have no gas storage in this State, which is hard to believe. We have underinvested in our electricity grid and we have an electricity pricing system that allows gas to set the price of all electricity, despite the fact that almost half the electricity generated here comes from wind. The price of gas has increased fivefold, as I said, but why are we paying more for wind-generated electricity? In the past year, I have raised the need to examine the EU-prescribed system for pricing electricity with the Minister of State, the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, and the Taoiseach. We need to reform the system as we enter an era of even higher prices. Even the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said the market system no longer works and we must reform and adapt it to the new realities. Spain and Portugal have already introduced a price cap on gas for power generation to try to address this problem.

If we are to have gas prices at five times the 2021 level for a sustained period, we need to look seriously at how we price renewable electricity. We need to urgently examine all options for reducing the price of electricity for households and small businesses. I keep raising this subject because we need a more robust response in Europe. There is more we can do to address the structures there. There is no reason whatever that gas should set electricity prices when so much electricity us produced from renewables. It does not make sense when it is the small businesses I mentioned and households that are really suffering.

I ask the Minister of State to also address the issue of those who have provided services and accommodation to the local authorities for our Ukrainian refugees. There seems to be a block in the system as payments are not being made. Small businesses in particular cannot sustain the credit facility they have provided. There is a block somewhere and I would appreciate it if the Minister of State examined the matter to free up the blockage so the local authorities can get this money and distribute it to the providers.

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