Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

An interesting point will be interplay between the retention of the deduction and any other changes that Government introduces with regard to energy supports more broadly and how that works out for individuals. It is extraordinary how external events impact behaviour in a collective way, whether it is the change to remote working and how much that has been of benefit to people, particularly families with children of a young age who have been able to be closer to home, which is so helpful.

Given the increase in energy costs, however, I wonder whether that behaviour will now shift back to the office environment and whether there will be incentives for people to spend more time at work instead of being at home, or what that balance may be in respect of transport costs and the additional costs of leaving a child in childcare for longer rather than being at home to avail of the shared heat and electricity available in office space. We did not expect the collective move to working from home in advance of the programme for Government. As the Minister said, we had hoped to provide it in the programme to enable that more but we did not expect the effect in that way. I wonder what the effect of this will be over the winter period.

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