Electricity Regulation (Amendment) Bill 2026: Second Stage [Private Members]
Dail Éireann — 2026-05-12
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Pa Daly (SF), Kerry

This all goes back to the fact that Ireland once had the lowest electricity prices in the EU. We now have the highest. Successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments have presided over this change, did nothing to stop it and in fact reinforced the system that caused it. I thank all of the other speakers of the Opposition, maybe bar one, who agreed with many of the merits in this Bill and who are calling for more transparency. We agree with their calls for more transparency, more public trust and more power for the CRU. We agree on many of the issues. Indeed, we agree with some of what the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, said earlier on. He acknowledges the problems and accepts that extra powers are needed for the CRU to be revamped.
Where we disagree, however, is where the Minister said that this is premature. That has been the problem to date because Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are continuing to act like workers and families are in a position to wait until next year's budget, but they are not able to wait that long. The Government may say that there is a review in place or that a review has been completed, and we have to wait for the energy affordability task force, which was established about a year ago but still has not recommended any reforms. Unfortunately, people do not have the luxury of waiting around for that.
I have listened to what has been said. Unfortunately, the Government is way behind with the retrofitting grants. EV-charging infrastructure and EV cars are weighted too much in favour of the wealthy. It is not fair. We are way behind on offshore wind. We are way behind on the onshore guidelines, and it is no wonder that one of its own Ministers said in an interview that the Government has been sitting on its hands and navel gazing about offshore wind. It has been way behind, and nothing has been done even in relation to the energy cloud.
In the course of the debate, the Minister for State mentioned the disconnection moratorium but there are many people who are on prepay or pay-as-you-go plans. In effect, there is a disconnection policy in place for all of those people. The problem is that we do not have statistics or the data. We need the CRU to be revamped. The Minister of State referred to the energy credits which were in place in the months running up the last election and then stripped away. The new alliance between Deputy O'Connor and the Taoiseach, Deputy Martin, whereby they are tapping each other on the back, is unfortunately distracting from the main issues. We need a windfall tax. We need transparency and we need the CRU to be revamped.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-05-12/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:49+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-12