Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)

Tá an Taoiseach as láthair, it seems. It is a nice surprise to see the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, today.

Temperatures are dropping rapidly as winter approaches. Household heating bills are rising just as fast. One million households across Ireland use oil for home heating, representing 38.9% of all households. The price of their bills has rocketed up by 9% in just one month. On its own, that would squeeze any household but that spike comes on top of a barrage of other price hikes. Energia, SSE Airtricity, Bord Gáis Éireann and Flogas have all put up their prices again. These are highly profitable energy companies doing very well, some would say obscenely well, while bill payers face an impossible choice to freeze or to feel the squeeze, trying to make ends meet this winter. People simply have no more to give, as I know the Minister will be aware. Before this cold snap hit, 300,000 people were already in arrears on their electricity bills. The Government has offered nothing to help reduce household costs or to reduce reliance on fossil fuels.

I know the Minister has just said of course we need to reduce reliance fossil fuels but the Government is way behind on retrofitting targets and so carbon emissions continue to rise. People living in draughty homes have no option but to rely on fuels that are unsustainable both for our planet and for household finances.

It is three and a half years since Russia's horrific onslaught on Ukraine but now in 2025 energy providers are hiding behind what is a geopolitical tragedy to justify price hikes that cannot be explained by supply costs. The Minister just spoke about Ireland's energy bills compared with our European counterparts. Our energy bills are still markedly higher. The driver of those prices is not war; it is corporate greed. We see that elsewhere too with supermarkets hiking their prices at the tills, rents and mortgages climbing, and people's personal finances under attack from all angles, having less and less left over at the end of each month - less for Christmas, car repairs, a burst pipe or any unforeseen eventualities.

What is most galling is the sense that things are much worse than they could be because the Government could be doing more.

The Government has given a message to hang in there but is offering no evidence that its policies are anything worth waiting for. In the Minister's previous response, he talked about a report due in 2026, but in a cost-of-living crisis, people need protection now against corporate greed. Labour has called on the Government to force supermarket giants to publish profits, yet the Government has refused to do so. It has refused to use its legal powers to control energy prices. The Government has spoken about meeting with energy companies in September, but what has come of that? Where are the promised hardship funds? Where are the promised supports for households? All we saw was one-off measures stripped away in the last budget in the service of VAT cuts for fast food giants. People are at the pin of their collars and the Government needs to take on these corporates. Will the Government finally tackle profiteering in energy prices, in groceries and in housing?

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