The government must introduce a targeted \u20ac400 energy credit to help people who are struggling with soaring energy prices, according to Social Democrats Finance Spokesperson Cian O\u2019Callaghan.<\/p>\n
Deputy O\u2019Callaghan said:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe war in the Middle East is now in its sixth day and the price of oil and gas is continuing to skyrocket. The average price for a half fill of oil has risen from under \u20ac500 to more than \u20ac750 in the last few days \u2013 an increase of more than 50 percent.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow are elderly people on pensions \u2013 or families with young children – supposed to pay these extortionate costs? They don\u2019t have a spare \u20ac250 sitting in their bank accounts to pay for home heating oil.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are already living week to week, struggling to keep their heads above water. Now, all they see on the horizon is an avalanche of price rises coming towards them.<\/p>\n
\u201cA succession of senior ministers have now accepted that gouging and profiteering is happening. However, they are refusing to do anything meaningful to help people through this energy price turmoil.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Social Democrats have proposed a fully-costed, targeted \u20ac400 energy credit which would be paid to 800,000 households. This would cost \u20ac362m, which is very affordable, and would provide relief to those individuals and families who are really struggling.<\/p>\n
\u201cElectricity prices in Ireland are already the most expensive in Europe; nearly 320,000 households are in arrears on their electricity bills and now the cost of home heating oil is rising exponentially. This is a crisis. The government must intervene.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The government must introduce a targeted \u20ac400 energy credit to help people who are struggling with soaring energy prices, according to Social Democrats Finance Spokesperson Cian O\u2019Callaghan. Deputy O\u2019Callaghan said: \u201cThe war in the Middle East is now in its sixth day and the price of oil and gas is continuing to skyrocket. The average […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11218,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[278,539,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cian-ocallaghan","category-energy","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n