‘Not a penny for regular Joe and Josephine,’ says Louth TD on energy crisis
Louth TD Ruairí Ó Murchú has accused the Government of failing to provide adequate support for families struggling with rising energy costs, particularly those who rely on home heating oil.
The Dundalk deputy raised the issue in the Dáil last week during a debate on supports for hauliers and supply chains, arguing that government measures to date have fallen short of what is needed to ease cost-of-living pressures.
He said there had been “insufficient action by Government to deal with the pressure people are under”, and claimed that some recent supports would not have been delivered without public protest.
“It is little that they are getting, but they would be getting nothing if it had not been for those protestors who went out onto the streets,” he said.
But he said that the “regular Joe and Josephine, the 750,000 people who use home heating oil are being left out altogether’ with ‘not a penny’ being provided by the government for them.”
He also highlighted rising energy costs, telling the Dáil that electricity bills increased by 19.2% over March and April, with 317,000 customers currently in arrears. He added that 25% of gas customers were also behind on their bills.
While acknowledging that international factors were influencing energy prices, Deputy Ó Murchú said people expected action from the government. We all accept this is down to the lunacy of Donald Trump being led by genocidal Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu.”
He added: “We understand there are limits to what the international community and the Government can do on that. However, people expect sense here. They expect supports”.
Among the measures he called for were energy credits to reduce electricity bills, cuts to fuel taxes, and further action on the cost of petrol and diesel. He said he was “astonished” that kerosene had not been addressed.
“I cannot get over the fact that kerosene has not been touched,” he said.
Deputy Ó Murchú called for an emergency budget, repeating Sinn Féin demands for cuts to the Universal Social Charge (USC) and the introduction of a cost-of-disability payment.