Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas don choiste as ucht an obair thábhachtach seo agus an deis é a phlé. I join Deputy Ó Cathasaigh and, I am sure, the House in expressing my deepest sympathy to the Cathaoirleach of the committee, Deputy Denis Naughten, on the untimely passing of his brother John. Our thoughts and our prayers are with Naughten family in these very dark days.

I thank the committee members and the secretariat for the work they have done in preparing this report. As Deputy Ó Cathasaigh has said, the high cost of energy has had a significant impact on the cost of living for many people, particularly in recent years as brought on by volatility in international markets. The Government introduced a suite of measures over that time to help households deal with the rising cost of electricity. In 2022, we saw the introduction of the Electricity Costs (Domestic Electricity Accounts) Emergency Measures Act, which provided for a one-off credit of €200 to be applied to all domestic electricity accounts. This was followed by two subsequent rounds of emergency credits announced in budgets 2023 and 2024. Together, these credits facilitated a transfer of €1,250 to more than 2.2 million households at a cost of approximately €2.75 billion. This is in addition to one-off increases to certain social welfare recipients such as those in receipt of the fuel allowance, pensioners, working families, carers, those living with a disability, and those in receipt of child benefit.

Inclusive of the costs of the universal energy credit and targeted groups across 2022, 2023 and 2024, the Government provided €7.1 billion worth of supports in acknowledgement of the energy crisis and cost-of-living crisis, which was a direct result of the inflationary pressure of increased energy costs. Further action was needed, however, and this is why we also introduced the largest social welfare package in the history of the State, providing €2.6 billion to assist households in budget 2025. This will be discussed next week.

Among the measures in place to assist people with the cost of energy to heat and light homes are an electricity costs emergency benefit payment of €250, including VAT, for an estimated 2.263 million domestic electricity accounts to be paid in two instalments; one in 2024 and the second in 2025. There will be a €300 cost-of-living lump-sum payment to all households getting fuel allowance, to be paid in November 2024. This means recipients will receive a total of €1,224 this winter, which includes their fuel allowance payments and the related lump sum.

There will be an increased means threshold for fuel allowance, extended to those aged 66 and over from January 2025, meaning more people will qualify for this very important support.

However, as Deputy Ó Cathasaigh said, there are more long-term and deeper structural issues mentioned in this report. Given that energy poverty is influenced not only by the cost of energy and a person’s income but also by the energy efficiency of their home, I welcome the prominence that Deputy Ó Cathasaigh and the committee have given to the issue of retrofitting. It is useful to inform the House about the measures introduced by the Government.

The national retrofit plan sets out how the Government is delivering on these retrofit targets. The national plan is designed to address barriers to retrofit across four key pillars: driving demand and activity; financing and funding; ensuring we have supply chain, skills and standards in place, and governance of those standards. For each pillar, barriers were identified and time-bound policies, measures and actions were put in place to address them.

The initiatives in the plan are also guided by a number of key principles, including: ensuring fairness to all and supporting a just transition; embracing a universal approach covering all housing types and consumer segments; and designing customer-centric solutions to reduce the costs and complexity, making the process easier for those investing in retrofit. However, I fully subscribe to Deputy Ó Cathasaigh's remarks regarding the complexity in this space.

The national retrofit plan is underpinned by a financial allocation of €8 billion to 2030, €5 billion of which will be sourced from carbon tax revenue. This year, a total of €527 million across Government has been allocated to support retrofit. Of this amount, a record total of €300 million will be spent on providing fully funded upgrades through the SEAI’s dedicated energy poverty schemes and local authority retrofits. I am happy to report that funding for these schemes will be increased further next year, with a €330 million allocation for the SEAI’s dedicated energy poverty schemes and local authority retrofits.

The retrofit plan is working, as can be clearly seen from the increasing levels of delivery in recent years. Last year saw over 47,900 home-energy upgrades supported by the SEAI. Almost 5,900 of those homes were fully funded upgrades under the warmer homes scheme with a further 730 approved housing body homes, AHB, upgraded under other SEAI schemes. Separately, more than 2,250 homes were upgraded under the Department of housing-funded local authority energy efficiency programme.

This year is on track to be another record year of progress under the SEAI schemes. To the end of September, 38,000 homes were upgraded, including 5,255 free upgrades under the warmer homes scheme. Local authority output figures will be available at the end of the year.

The committee’s report made a number of recommendations regarding the warmer homes scheme, which provides free energy upgrades for households at risk of energy poverty, as spoken about by Deputy Ó Cathasaigh. Since February 2022, the scheme has put a particular focus on the worst-performing properties by prioritising homes built and occupied before January 1993 and that have a pre-works building energy rating, BER, of E, F or G. This has had the impact of significantly reducing waiting times for these homes, which are most in need of support. These E , F and G-rated homes now have an average delivery time of 17 months, which is a reduction of nine months compared to 2022. Better performing homes have an average delivery time of 20 months, a reduction of six months compared to 2022. The reductions in the average waiting times for both cohorts of homes have been achieved in part through the following actions: the SEAI has been allocated additional staff for the warmer homes scheme; active contract engagement and management to increase contractor output; actions to address ongoing supply chain and inflationary pressures; a record budget allocation of €208.8 million for 2024 and a new €700 million contractor panel has been put in place for the next four years, which has increased contractor capacity to 36.

The committee's report has noted the difficulties with upgrading older homes that were constructed using more traditional methods. I suspect that many of us have experienced those personally. Wall insulation is not recommended under any of the SEAI’s residential energy efficiency schemes on dwellings built before 1940, which are constructed in stone, single-leaf masonry or composite wall construction. This is because standard or modern retrofit solutions are often not suitable for these buildings, as they can lead to adverse and unintended consequences such as damp and mould, and affect the health and well-being of the people living there. However, we recognise that these homes also need to be upgraded and significant work has taken place to develop a pilot scheme to upgrade traditional buildings. Works taking place under the pilot will be guided by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage’s guidance on Energy Efficiency in Traditional Buildings. The pilot will commence later this year and an interim evaluation will be prepared in Q2 of 2025 to inform any future development required.

All home upgrades will be completed by Q4 of 2025, with a final report on the pilot findings to be delivered by the end of January 2026. In the meantime, the SEAI is actively reviewing homes applying under the warmer homes scheme to ensure that shallow measures are maximised where they are not suitable for deeper upgrades. This includes heating system controls, LEDs and lagging jackets by way of examples. It is important to note though that in practice, the SEAI is finding that in many cases, such measures are already in place in the homes, so accordingly, this initiative will be kept under review.

Many households that need support are not eligible for the warmer homes scheme. This is why a range of supports are available through the SEAI, including: a special enhanced grant rate for attic and cavity wall insulation; schemes supporting a step-by-step approach that allows homeowners to retrofit their home in stages over a number of years; and a new home energy upgrade loan scheme, which will help reduce the financial challenges for many homeowners and will play a crucial role in helping homeowners to invest in energy efficiency.

I thank Deputy Ó Cathasaigh for his considered overview of the report and, in particular, the light he shed on the submission by the Irish Cancer Society. That is not a position that anyone wants any family member or loved one to be in as they approach the end of life. I will draw my colleagues' attention to this.

The Government is committed to providing practical supports for those experiencing energy poverty and who want to upgrade the efficiency of their home. During the course of its term in office, I think the Government has shown exceptional commitment in this area.

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