John Cummins (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House and thank him for being here. Today is significant for our society and economy. We have had an €11 billion cost-of-living budget with a combination of universal and targeted measures to support and put money back into the pockets, wallets and purses of people throughout the country. It is good for families, individuals and business. I recognise and acknowledge the prudence shown by the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, over a number of years, by the Minister, Deputy Michael McGrath, in recent years and by the former Minister, Michael Noonan, prior to this. I am sure the Minister of State will agree this has ensured the Irish economy has the firepower to be able to tackle the significant challenges we face as a country, not least with regard to energy. I will home in on these measures. It is very important and welcome that we are supporting households across the board with a universal measure of three €200 credits. We are extending the threshold for the fuel allowance from €120 to €200 above the State pension and the limits to €500 per week for a single pensioner and to €1,000 per week for a pensioner couple aged 70 or over. This will result in a significant additional cohort of people being brought into the net of the fuel allowance. We are introducing a €400 payment along with this in November. We are putting money at the heart of supporting people at a time of great need.We have also put our money where our mouth is in supporting business. We did so throughout the Covid-19 pandemic and we are continuing to do it now with the new €1.2 billion temporary business energy support scheme, which will support businesses with 40% of the cost of the increase in their energy bills. These are welcome measures among many others. I would like to keep talking and go through the other measures but I will hand over to my colleague, Senator Ahearn, to discuss some of them.