John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I would like to extend a welcome to Aisling Dunne and her son Jack, on behalf of Deputy Ó Súilleabháin. They are very welcome to the Public Gallery, and I hope they enjoy their visit to Dáil Éireann.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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Cuireann an scéim fhoráil Iúil tacaíocht ríthábhachtach samhraidh ar fáil do pháistí a bhfuil riachtanais bhreise acu. Níl na tacaíochtaí seo roghnach le haghaidh roinnt páistí; tá siad riachtanach. Go fóill ar fud an Stáit, tá an Rialtas ag insint le teaghlaigh go bhfuil na tacaíochta seo á gcailliúint acu. I mbliana, níor osclaíodh an tréimhse iarratais don scéim fhoráil Iúil ach ar feadh seachtain amháin. Sna blianta roimhe seo, bhí míonna ag na scoileanna leis an bpróiseas a chur i gcrích. Beidh páistí a bhfuil riachtanais bhreise acu fágtha ar leataobh anois gan na tacaíochtaí ríthábhachtacha seo don samhradh. Is iad na páistí féin a bheidh thíos leis.

The July provision scheme provides vital summer educational supports for children with additional needs, and for many children, these supports are not optional; they are absolutely essential. They provide structure, routine, stability and continuity during the summer months. Yet, right across the State, families are now being told their children are going to be denied and will lose out on these vital supports because of a deeply unfair and badly handled decision by the Department of education.

I have been contacted by principals, teachers and parents who are deeply distressed. They are all telling me the same thing; they are angry, upset and desperate to be heard. Parents are lying awake at night, worrying about what will happen to their child now. How can a Government, which constantly proclaims to include and support children with additional needs, allow this to happen? Schools and families have been pleading with the Department to intervene but their appeals are falling on deaf ears over and over again.

This year, the application window for the July provision was open for just one week. In previous years, schools had months to complete this process. Many schools simply did not have sufficient time to process applications, gather the paperwork and complete the registration before the portal was closed. The real life consequences of all this is that children with additional needs are now locked out of vital education support this summer. It is absolutely appalling.

However, it is not an isolated problem. This is happening to families right across the State. Parents are facing enormous battles accessing services for their children. As we know, they are already struggling to secure assessments, therapies, tutors and SNAs, and many feel they are constantly being pushed from one waiting list to another - from one bureaucratic process to another. Meanwhile, supports remain under-resourced and out of reach for many of them, and now we have this on top of all that, with more stress, worry and upset.

These are children with additional needs. We have to think about that for a minute. These are children with additional needs, and their families are already carrying a huge emotional and financial burden. These are parents who spend every day fighting for supports and services, simply to ensure their child is treated with dignity. Now, Government is effectively telling them their child will lose out on support that they so desperately need and have relied on year after year because of an unreasonably tight deadline, bureaucracy and red tape. Families do not understand it, teachers do not understand it and, for the life of me, I do not understand it. This is mean spirited and penny pinching. It is penny pinching at the expense of vulnerable children, and it is not on.

We have raised this again and again. Teachers have raised this and parents have been pleading with Government to act but it refuses to do so. Yesterday, my party Leader, Deputy McDonald, raised it with the Taoiseach and he ignored her question. Is the Tánaiste going to listen and do the right thing? Will he acknowledge the hurt, anxiety and anger at the decision Government has taken and will he listen to the pleas of the parents, teachers and principals? Will he immediately reopen and extend the application portal, so that no child with additional needs will be denied supports this summer? We need certainty right now.

Deputies:

Hear, hear.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Yes, we will. I thank Deputy Doherty and Deputies across the House, including on the Government benches, for raising this issue. We will reopen the portal. The Deputy is right; on occasions we can agree in this House. This is a vital programme that plays a very important part in the lives of children with additional needs, be they special educational needs or children from areas of economic disadvantage. The summer programme is a vital support for families. It is specifically designed to support children with complex educational needs and those at risk of educational disadvantage. We are very much committed to continuing to expand and grow the programme, and the facts will show this is exactly what has happened, which I will get to in a moment.

The Minister for education has very much listened directly to the concerns of schools, principals, teachers and parents. I am pleased to confirm the portal will be reopened to allow further schools to apply. The Minister will announce details of the extension shortly because everyone in this House knows the summer programme is an absolutely crucial support for families over the holiday period. It has huge benefits for children in their social and emotional well-being. We are absolutely committed, as I believe everybody across this House is, to growing and supporting that summer programme.

You only have to look at the numbers to show the growth in the programme. In 2020, 545 schools and nearly 23,000 children took part in the programme, and just five years later, last year, more than 1,800 schools and almost 71,000 children participated. That is a 210% increase. This is a scheme that is rightly growing year-on-year. The intention and continued emphasis of that programme is to mitigate the impact of learning loss, if you like, on those children while the school is closed. All schools can participate in the programme, with a particular focus on increasing participation in special schools.

As the Deputy correctly said, the online portal for the summer programme, including the home-based summer programme which is another element of it, was open from 6 to 15 May. I am told all stakeholders were made aware of the timeframe for the portal but I am also very aware that it is a particularly busy time for schools and the community. There is a lot going on as you get towards the end of the school year. A reminder was sent to schools but that is somewhat missing the point. The point is there is a need for a longer period of time for schools to apply to get this up and running.

For the information of the House, I also understand the Department has received more applications this year across primary, post-primary and special schools compared to last year. In addition, the number of home-based applications has also significantly increased on last year. Perhaps because of that, we want to make sure the children who need this programme get it. That is why my colleague, the Minister for education, will announce that short extension shortly, so that schools that have missed the deadline for very genuine reasons - and the Deputy has highlighted some of those reasons, such as it being a shorter window than previous years - will have the opportunity to reapply.

Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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I welcome the decision to reopen the portal, and I ask that clarity be given to schools and parents immediately. The Tánaiste talked about a short extension but it needs to be long enough to deal with the process. As a result of the botched situation this year, there is now huge pressure to allocate tutors, so this cannot happen again.

I want to raise an additional issue relating to this year. My understanding is the scheme has also changed, in that there is now only one option, where all the pupils take either the school-based or home-based programme. That locks medically vulnerable children out of the system. If the school decides on a school-based programme, you cannot have a home-based programme for that medically vulnerable child. I spoke to a parent of a child who is 13 years of age and who has missed a lot of school because of their medical vulnerability. They have care every night from the HSE, which proves their medical vulnerability. As the portal only allows you to do one or the other, they cannot avail of the school-based programme.

They need a home-based programme. I ask the Tánaiste, in examining this issue, to also examine that issue and make sure that medically vulnerable students are not denied the option, which until now was always the case, to avail of either-or.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I do not want to mislead the House. On the last issue, I need to talk to the Minister for education and ask that she comes back to the Deputy, as I am sure she will. I take the seriousness of the point he makes. Schools will be contacted today because the Deputy is right that they need that clarity. My understanding is that, while the schools will be contacted today, the portal will open next week.

This is a programme that is growing very significantly in terms of the numbers of children. We all know in our own constituencies and in our own communities the very significant difference it is making to children as well. Looking back, in 2016, 8,767 children benefited from that scheme. Like I said, last year it was over 70,000. That is a sign of a programme that is working, and I thank all those around the country who provide this programme. It is also a sign, though, of the need, the fact that there are now so many children with those complex additional needs. I share the Deputy's view that this is not a discretionary extra or a nice-to-have but a vital part of education provision and family support.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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It is important that the Opposition keeps the Government honest on public spending. It is important too that reliable figures are given to the Opposition ahead of the annual budget so we know exactly what it costs to fund education, health and other important services. That has not been the case in recent years. We need to know exactly what it costs to fund existing services, the extra money that is needed to keep the show on the road and what money is needed for new measures. We in Labour believe honest politics means keeping the Opposition honest too. Last year the Department of public expenditure and reform refused to give out these demographic costs or information as to what it would take to maintain existing levels of service. We were met with triangulation and obfuscation. We ask every year how much is needed to meet the growing needs in special education. In budget 2026 we were sold a pup but, more importantly, so were the very families and children who need that support. Weeks ago we were told of an astonishing €646 million black hole in the Department of education. How did the Tánaiste and his colleagues get budget 2026 so badly wrong?

What is the Government's answer? A levy, effective cuts by another name, in 2027 to every Department's budget, even before pre-budget talks open. Getting direct answers from various Ministers over the past few weeks on how this will work has been like pulling teeth.

What do we know? We know that the Minister for Health, for example, has said in replies to me that she will have to find €175 million in savings to plug the hole in education. This is on top of the fact that the HSE has overspent to the tune of €250 million in the early part of this year alone. Taken in the round, then, as we speak, the Department of Health and the HSE are now on the hook for at least €425 million this year and next. The Government says that pay in health will remain untouched. That will be the case for the Department of justice as well. Which services, then, will be cut or scaled back? Which planned new services will be stalled? All of us who are health service users have a right to know. It is more money, not less, that our under-pressure health services need, and there is a limit to the efficiencies and reforms that can be extracted from a service that is already under very significant pressure. The problem is that the Minister, Deputy Chambers, has put a deadline of 17 July on Departments coming back to him with their cost-cutting proposals. I am no conspiracy theorist, but that is the day after the Dáil rises - zero accountability from this Government over the summer on the kinds of cuts we will see next year.

Will the Tánaiste commit to giving us honest figures on demographic costs and the cost of maintaining existing levels of service this year and next? Will he confirm that there will be no further asks through significant supplementary budgets being brought to the House this year for various Government Departments? I directly ask him the following question and I expect a response. What kinds of cuts does he feel need to take place in health to fund the costs in education?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I believe in honest politics as well, and I think everyone in this House engages in good faith on behalf of the people they represent, as the Deputy does too.

I reject the assertion that this is in any manner of means a cut because that would suggest that the budget of one Department will be lower than it currently is. The budgets of all Departments are growing. I do not need to remind the Labour Party, which served in government at a very difficult time, what cuts are like, when we had to make extraordinarily hard decisions to get this country out of the depths of an economic crisis. The level of public expenditure in Ireland has risen. Voted expenditure the year before Covid was €67.4 billion. Voted expenditure is now due to be €147.2 billion by 2030 and €125.5 billion next year, so the budget for every Department - he referred to the Department of Health - will be higher in 2027 than it is in 2026. It is higher in 2026 than it was in 2025. I do not believe there is anybody in Ireland watching in on these proceedings who does not believe that savings, efficiencies and reforms can be found in the public service. People do this in their own lives all the time. I think people remember the times when the Deputy and I were in government and we were asking people to find savings with less. We are now asking people to find savings with a hell of a lot more. Even if there were not a need for a levy, I think that is prudent, good management of the public purse. Every week, whether you go to the PAC or certain other committees, you can find examples of where the public service can do more and do better in terms of the expenditure of the public purse.

This will not impact 2026 allocations, and the Minister has been very clear about that. As to what Government colleagues are being asked, the Government is a collective. If we decide to do more here, it does not fall from a magic money tree; it has to be found somewhere. That is how the world works. That is how budgeting should work. That is how our medium-term fiscal plan works. Colleagues are being asked, though, in the context of 2027 budgets, where every Government Department's budget will increase, to find efficiencies and reforms. It is a very important moment of truth for the public service as well. This will not impact the 2026 allocations.

As the Deputy also rightly says, we have been very clear that the levy must not impact important areas. For example, the Minister, Deputy Calleary, is here. It must not impact the social protection Vote, people with a disability, carers or those weekly payments. It must not impact Department of Health pay allocations - in other words, staffing - or Department of justice staffing. It must not impact housing, disability services or a number of other carve-outs. This is a levy that ranges from about 0.02% to 1.4%. In the context of a budget this year of over €118 billion and a budget next year of over €125 billion, people are being asked to find that level of efficiency. We should and we will, of course, continue to engage honestly and transparently on all these matters.

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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That commitment to engage honestly and transparently should extend to Government Ministers and the Departments being required to come back to the Minister for public expenditure and reform well before 17 July with their very clear plans as to how these levies will impact services in their respective Departments. The reality is that the Dáil is rising on 16 July, and I do not believe that it is a coincidence that the deadline of 17 July was set. We do need accountability in this House. We know that, for example, the medium-term expenditure framework was published the day after the Dáil rose last December. That is a very significant five-year plan from the point of view of the fiscal position of this country and how we sustain our economy going forward. This is very much on brand for this Government: make important decisions when the Dáil is in recess, with no accountability and with Ministers not being available to be held to account by this House for their own budgets for 2027 and their own Estimates in advance of budget 2027. This is a very significant development from the Minister for public expenditure.

There are alternatives to the introduction of levies across Departments. We could look at, for example, reforming our taxation system and ensuring we introduce tax on wealth and assets in a more significant way to pay for the increased public services we all agree we need to introduce, but the Government has decided not to do that.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Respectfully, Ministers not being held to account is baloney. We had a budget oversight committee meeting the other day. In fairness, the Deputy was at it, he contributed and he asked all his questions. Others did not bother turning up. The meeting ended 40 minutes early. The Minister, Deputy Chambers, and I were there looking for questions to take, and the Chairman-----

Gerald Nash (Louth, Labour)
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I had to leave to speak here, actually.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I just want to be clear. The budget oversight committee met. The Minister, Deputy Chambers, and I were there to answer every and any question anybody wanted to ask, and it ended with 40 minutes to spare, which the Chairman then filled.

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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It is Government TDs who do not turn up.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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It does not matter who did not turn up.

A Deputy:

It does.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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People can come back in with further questions as well. There were 40 minutes of unallocated time there. We are very accountable to this Oireachtas, and I want people at home to know that.

I also want people to know that the rising of the Dáil has nothing to do with this at all because these are figures that will affect 2027, when there will be a significant opportunity. We will have a summer economic statement, a national economic dialogue and plenty of opportunities.

I believe in good, honest politics. So does Deputy Nash. I fully accept that. It is important we are transparent in relation to all these things, but it is also important, in the spirit of honesty, that we make the following point, and people at home know this. Public spending is growing very fast in this country relative to pretty much any other European economy.

It is a prudent and sensible thing to say to those charged with expending that money, "Can you do better? Can you reform? Can you get value for money?" That is what households and small businesses do; it is about time the public service did it.

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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There is a brutal truth at the heart of our disability system. Families have been forced to say it out loud because the Government is not listening. The reality is the State is waiting for parents to die. Parents in their 70s, 80 and 90s must continue to act as full-time carers for sons or daughters with intellectual disabilities. Regardless of their age, health and ability to care for another adult, if they are still alive, the State looks the other way.

The system for housing adults with intellectual disabilities is both nonsensical and unusually cruel. When a parent passes away, only then will an emergency placement be found for their son or daughter. That placement is too often hundreds of miles away from their home. Within the space of a few weeks, a vulnerable person will lose their parent, their carer, their home, their friends, their community and any semblance of the life they once knew. No civilised society should treat its citizens like this.

There are more than 600 adults with intellectual disabilities in residential placements outside of their home county. Almost 200 are in placements that are over 100 km from their homes. There are people from Cork in Kildare, people from Waterford in Dublin and people from Kildare in Tipperary. Hundreds of vulnerable people are being ripped from their communities at the most difficult time of their lives. The Minister, Deputy Foley, recently announced that local authorities will be required to set disability housing targets, but people cannot live in targets and families cannot wait for to see if these homes will ever materialise.

The State's growing reliance on private operators is a symptom of a deeper disfunction. The Muiríosa Foundation, a progressive section 38 provider, recently told the Joint Committee on Disability Matters that it is forced to rely on the private rental market. This means that it invests tens of thousands of euro to meet HIQA standards, only to face eviction if a landlord decides to sell. At the same time, commercial companies funded by the Government can buy up properties far from a resident's home and community. This privatisation of care is of serious concern to parents. They do not want their sons or daughters outsourced for profit; they want them to be housed and cared for in their communities.

Adults with intellectual disabilities deserve to live with dignity, security and independence. Targets alone are not enough. The Before We Die campaign wants a disability housing plan that includes delivery timelines, clear reporting and multi-annual ring-fenced funding. Will the Tánaiste finally listen to these parents? Will he meet them? They have asked to meet with him but he has not arranged to meet with them yet. Will the Government introduce the ring-fenced funding that is clearly needed to provide homes for adults with intellectual disabilities?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue. It is good to see his colleague Deputy Ennis settling in well beside him. I think I have been in touch to arrange to meet them. I will be meeting them in June. The Taoiseach has also met them, as have the Minister, Deputy Foley, and the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins. When I say "them", I mean the Before We Die group. I thank them for their work and advocacy and for shining a spotlight on this situation.

Sometimes you just have to stand up in this House and admit that where we are is not where we need to be. This is one of those occasions. I have a load of figures here and can tell the Deputy that we are going to do more residential placements this year, which we are. I can tell him we have increased the disability budget, and we have. None of that takes away from the point he has made, which is valid, accurate and reflects the lived experience of far too many people in this country.

We had a good meeting of the Cabinet committee on disability a couple of weeks ago in respect of housing specifically. This was motivated by the campaign of the Before We Die group. At that meeting, a number of things were agreed. I acknowledge the role the Ministers, Deputies Browne and Foley, and the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins, will play in respect of this matter. We need everybody to pull together on it. A number of principles were set out in the context of shifting away from a crisis response to commissioning specialist residential places and towards a planned approach. The Deputy is right. There are far too many emergency situations whereby if the State had planned earlier and better, would not have needed to arise. Second, we need a rebalancing towards more placements with non-profit providers and social housing and away from privately funded housing.

The Deputy's point is right. If it is a criticism, it is right. We are using quite a lot of private for-profit providers. It is better to use them than not to have any option available, but the direction of travel is to ensure that local authorities, as the housing authorities in communities, are stepping up to provide housing for persons with disabilities in the same way they would when it comes to broader social housing. We can and should be doing more to support non-profit providers to build homes. This used to happen. I can think of where in my community there is a small housing estate with a relatively small number of homes and specialist staff in place, and it works.

The points the Deputy makes are valid. We will need a plan. I take the point about targets. We want to house people, but at the same time we need targets. The Deputy stated that there needs to be specificity around them in the context of funding and timelines. That is a fair point. Whatever is the best way to do this, whether it is at an Oireachtas committee or in this House, I am happy to have debate on how we get this right. This group is putting it up to us as a country to do better, and we simply have to.

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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I welcome that the Tánaiste is being frank about how appalling the situation is and is acknowledging that it has to change and is not acceptable. If the Government is serious about not-for-profit providers being able to play a better role, it must provide ring-fenced multi-annual funding in order that they can plan for services.

I will provide an example. Before the Tánaiste's party took office, St. Michael's House had five respite homes in 2008. It now has just one. There is a six-year waiting list for adults with intellectual disabilities to access respite. As parents are getting older and becoming exhausted, they cannot even access respite for their loved ones. That is an appalling situation. Is the Government going to address that? There is no need for this to be happening. The HSE has been aware of the needs of adults with an intellectual disabilities for years. It does not need to wait for crisis situations to occur. This could be fixed and it needs to be fixed. Targets are one thing ,but we need clear timelines and ring-fenced multi-annual funding. Will the Tánaiste commit to that? When are we going to get information about that?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I am going to commit to meeting the group in June. I am happy to engage further with the Deputy on this matter after that. This is an interesting area in respect of which extra funding is 100% required but where monitoring the impact of that funding on the systems in place also matters. For example, we are increasing respite funding by €25 million this year. We are also increasing funding for home support and personal assistance hours this year. I can say that, and it is true, but then there are demographic and planning issues and the issue of how the money is deployed. If it is deployed in an emergency capacity, it ends up having less impact because it costs more than in a planned capacity, which, I think, at a high level, is the point the group is making.

We need a housing plan when it comes to people with disabilities. It will need to have targets and specific timelines and the Government will need to fund it, but I want a better shared understanding of what the direction of travel looks like. Not every person with a disability is the same, and no one is suggesting they are. Some might be able to continue to live in the community and the family home, some might need a specialist residential service and some might need local authority housing. For some individuals, none of these options might work at all. A plan that tries to address that breadth is important. We should facilitate detailed engagement in this House on that.

Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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Today in Ireland, a pensioner living alone or a family pays almost twice as much for a unit of electricity than a data centre. This is despite the fact many data centres are parts of the wealthiest corporations in the world. The demand from data centres is driving up the cost of electricity. In 2024, data centres consumed 22% of electricity in Ireland. That was more than every household in urban Ireland. That is an incredible figure. A report released today by Friends of the Earth shows that, on our current trajectory, data centres will add €1.4 billion to the cost of household electricity in the coming years. That is a hidden data centre tax.

Every week at my constituency clinic, this is a major issue. Last week, an elderly pensioner came to my clinic and showed me her electricity bill.

She asked me if it could be real, such was the extortionate level of the amount listed. The cost of electricity is a major issue in the cost-of-living crisis. Over 300,000 people are in energy arrears. In many cases, these are hard-working people and pensioners. They are really struggling. The policy of the Government has essentially been to offer energy credits before an election and then abandon them afterwards.

Data centres are paying about 50% less per unit of electricity. Families cannot understand this and are really frustrated. This is by design, in many respects. The trajectory is going to add more costs to households. When will the Government introduce legislation to regulate the data centre sector in the context of electricity prices? When is it going to introduce a sustainable policy in this regard?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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What was definitely not on my bingo card for 2026 was Aontú quoting Friends of the Earth, but politics throws new things at you every day.

The issue relating to the cost of electricity and the energy crisis in Ireland is a serious one. That is why this Government, through the Minister, Deputy Calleary, is expanding the fuel allowance. We extended the allowance for a further month in order to help people like those the Deputy referenced. It is also why we have taken a number of decisions to reduce excise on diesel and petrol. The benefit of that from an inflationary point of view is worth about 0.5% in keeping general downward pressure on a rising inflation rate. It is also why we need to accelerate the move towards renewables. There have been some constructive suggestions from Opposition and Government Deputies around how we can do more in relation to making it easier for people to make that transition in terms of their homes or businesses. The Minister, Deputy O'Brien, has already introduced a range of measures that are helping make their homes warmer. Hundreds of thousands of homes have now benefited from direct Government grants to retrofit and replace windows and doors. Of course, there have also been changes regarding electric vehicles.

I am interested in the Deputy's position on data centres. It is easy to say that data centres are bad or to make them the bogeyman. I am the Minister for Finance, and the evidence available to the Government is that across the six sectors in Ireland that are identified as being most dependent on data centres, it is estimated that of the order of €100 billion in annual gross value added, 875,000 jobs and €14.6 million in annual employment-related taxes were enabled by data centre capacity located in Ireland. It has also been identified that the hyperscale data centres sit at the heart of Ireland's global digital competitiveness.

When I make all these changes the Deputy is calling on me to make in relation to data centres, what does he want to do when we do not have the benefit of the taxes? What does he want to cut? What does he not want to fund? It is so easy to come in here and ask us to spend more. It is easy to slice up the pie, but it is a hell of a lot harder to bake the pie and bake a bigger pie in terms of economic success for this country.

It is also important to say that in the context of the Commission for Regulation of Utilities' large energy user connection policy, we have been very clear that data centres above a certain threshold will be required to meet at least 80% of their annual demand with new additional renewable electricity generated in the Republic of Ireland. Government policy firmly aims to enable the twin transitions of digitalisation and decarbonisation. We cannot pick and choose; we have to address both of them. We are talking about AI. We are talking how about how we support AI jobs and how we deal with the fact that there is going to be a significant churn in the labour market. Data centres play a very important role in having a competitive digital economy. We cannot just dismiss that or ridicule it. If we are going to do so, we must at least be honest with the people about the economic and tax impacts that could have on Ireland. If the Deputy puts it out there that a data centre is about four or five lads sitting around with a dog or something and nothing else in terms of economic activity, that is an economically illiterate point to make in relation to data centres.

Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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If the Government is going to make Ireland the data centre capital of Europe, it better have a plan. A plan does not mean that ordinary households are subsidising data centres. That is currently what is happening. The report to which I refer estimates that the current trajectory in terms of data centres is 22%, and that this is on the rise and is driving up the cost of energy in this country. The truth is that this is going to mean an estimated €1.4 billion in additional costs to consumers over the next number of years. Some 300,000 people are already in energy arrears. Ireland has the most expensive electricity prices in Europe. The ESB is profiteering. It made €650 million last year. The CEO of the ESB earns over €300,000. Who is the ESB serving? Who is the Government's energy policy serving in a situation where data centres are driving up the energy costs for families and paying less per unit of electricity?

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy is ignoring the point I am making. It sounds very good in short clips and sound bites, but the reality is that he is ignoring the economic benefit of the data centres. He is ignoring the economic benefit in terms-----

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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It is a cost too in the context of electricity.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I am sorry. Deputy Tóibín is giving Deputy Lawless a chance today.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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It is a cost.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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He is giving him a chance today.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I did not think that the weekend went so badly for Deputy Tóibín that he has had a leadership heave against him. Anyway, he should give the man a chance.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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The Tánaiste is ignoring the cost.

Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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I am talking about the energy crisis and families across Ireland.

John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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Allow the Tánaiste to respond.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The rules are that the Deputy asks the question and I get a chance to answer it.

For people sitting at home, I want to outline the reality of the situation. Aontú, on behalf of Friends of the Earth, is suggesting that data centres are costing all of this money. That ignores the fact that I put on the record of the House the economic analysis available to me, as Minister of Finance, in terms of the benefit to this country in terms of taxes and employment. The Government does not have the luxury of ignoring that. If we did ignore it, the Deputies would be the first to come into this House and condemn the loss of jobs.

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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The Tánaiste is ignoring the cost.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I want to say this. The Friends of the Earth report will be considered. That report says things the Deputy did not mention. It concedes that under the high renewable growth scenario, we actually see a situation where accelerated renewables are presented as sufficient to displace significant reliance on gas. The message the Deputy should have taken from the report is that we need to accelerate the move to renewables. That is what this Government is committed to. If Aontú is willing to finally step up and accept that climate action is needed, I welcome that conversion.