Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to raise the cost of living crisis we have and the comments that were made by the Minister of State, Deputy Fleming, on yesterday’s “Drivetime”. The Minister of State told people to stop complaining and to do some work for themselves by shopping around to find value in energy, gas and insurance.Someone in receipt of a salary in excess of €100,000 telling people to shop around rightly caused outrage among listeners. I welcome that the Minister of State apologised for those comments because they showed just how out of touch he is with the day-to-day struggles people are experiencing in trying to make ends meet. They are having to make the choice between eating and heating.

While he apologised and his tone might have been off, there is nothing in what the Minister of State said in that interview that contradicts Government policy on energy poverty. "Shop around" and "switch supplier" is the advice repeated by various Ministers any time the issue of energy poverty is raised in these Houses. That is despite the fact that the energy poverty strategy that lapsed in 2019 clearly outlined there are mounting barriers to prevent people who are in energy poverty from switching supplier. The Government has known since a 2015 report was released that switching supplier is not straightforward. Despite this, advising people to switch supplier continues to be Government policy. It still tells people to shop around as a way to combat energy poverty. The Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, told me that in response to parliamentary questions. I have been told the same by the Ministers of State, Deputies Noonan, Ossian Smyth and Fleming. In both of these Houses, that line is being used in official responses all the time. We are told that people need to switch supplier and shop around to bring down the cost of energy.

The energy poverty strategy clearly outlined there is an issue around switching and there are barriers for people who want to do so. We were promised a review of the implementation of the strategy in 2021 but we have not seen that. How can we expect the issue of energy poverty to be addressed if we are not using evidence-based policymaking? Hiding behind the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, CRU, will not wash either. When the Government tells people to shop around, it also points in the direction of the CRU. Let me give an example of what the regulator in Britain does. It caps the default tariff energy providers can charge their customers who, for one reason or another, do not or cannot switch supplier. The tariff is capped. Likewise, the English regulator directly intervenes in the prepaid tariff rates. Prepaid tariff rates are significantly higher in this country despite the fact that those who avail of them are the people who are most vulnerable, under most pressure and struggling to manage their bills and income.

I would like the Leader of the House to get an update on when we will get the new energy poverty strategy, when we will see the review of the implementation of the previous strategy and when the Central Statistics Office will produce the indicators that will allow us to accurately gauge whether Government policy is addressing energy poverty. Simply telling people to shop around is not good enough. I am glad the Minister of State, Deputy Fleming, said what he did because now we can all see this is Government policy. It was not just a gaffe on the radio.