Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)

The Taoiseach's own officials warned him. They said that without Government support, customers will pay more this winter for electricity than at any time during the energy crisis. They said that before price increases, arrears had increased to record levels. We know this and the Taoiseach knew this. It is in black and white in what his officials told him. They make clear and lay out in graphs that families will have to find an extra €321 this winter compared with last winter to pay their energy bills. The Government had all this information, yet still decided to abandon workers and families by withdrawing these energy credits. It did that at a time when the Taoiseach knew and his officials told him energy company after energy company had decided to increase their prices in these months. Over 1 million families are going to see price increases. His officials warned him and he chose to ignore them and abandoned workers.

I will ask the Taoiseach again. Why did he cancel the energy credits despite the warnings from his own officials? Why did he ignore the fact that arrears had reached record levels and that families would have to find €321 and pay higher energy prices than ever before during the energy crisis? Why did he choose to ignore all of that and abandon these workers at this time?

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