Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I too am very concerned with the idea of a windfall tax for anyone at the expense of the public. We here are the guardians of the public. The Minister of State and his Government are driving people into the hands of these energy providers that are making four times the profit they need to make. I do not begrudge them profit. I have operated in business too and you do need to make a fair profit, but it is not the way to run a house to push people and to take so much off them that the Government finds itself giving back energy credits. The Government should have control. There is an energy regulator but there is no account from it. It is doing what it likes or it is doing nothing at all. The Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, who is supposed to be its boss, does not care. He closed down Bord na Móna, where we had State-owned fuel, in the blink of an eye. The Government is now driving people into these fellows' hands, enticing them with grants to put in heat pumps or what-have-you and it is only codding them. The Government is not being fair. We are the guardians of the public and what the Government is doing is criminal. There is no account of the regulator, and no account of the Minister who is in charge of the regulator, which is doing nothing at all. We are here discussing how we will manage a windfall tax.

God almighty, a Cheann Comhairle, it is a sad state of affairs that this is what our country has come to, and that this is what the Government is doing to the people of Ireland, our own people. The Government is a shame, a crying shame for doing this. There is no law or order to what it is doing at all. I ask the Minister of State at this late stage to cop on and put some rein on these energy regulators. The Government is going to grant-aid more of them but it is going to paralyse the people by getting them to pay whatever number these energy providers think of. This is criminal. I ask the Minister of State to rethink what he is doing. Does he think that he is codding the people by giving them energy credits of €150 now and €150 later on?

A pile of small businesses are closing. I gave an example of a lady in mid-Kerry who had a small café. She closed it down the week before last because she was paying €100 a day for electricity. Her bill for 48 days was €4,800. She is closed now, along with many others. It is very wrong what we are doing here. We cannot stop the Government because Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party have joined up to do this to the people of Ireland. This is one of the worst acts the Government has carried out. This Chamber should be full here tonight to discuss what is going on because it has such a massive effect in terms of the repercussions for every man, woman and child.

There is talk about using more electricity. To give one example, there is such a thing as hydrotreated vegetable oil, HVO. All we need to do is take the tax off that and we would reduce emissions for everyone who uses it by 87%. They could use the same vehicles. They could make very minor adjustments to their fuel pumps for driving the radiators in their houses. They could pour the vegetable oil into the same oil tank and that is all the modification that is needed. HVO can be poured straight into a diesel car and it can drive on without any change in the world. What the Government is doing is taxing those people and making HVO more expensive to buy than it is to buy the fossil fuels coming from Iran or whatever other parts of the world. The Government is ignoring that fact.

The Government has no scruples at all. It is talking about paying more carbon tax. All it is doing is charging the people and driving them into the ground. Here we are tonight discussing how to manage the windfall tax. God almighty, it is a shame and a disgrace what the Government is at. This Chamber should be full because it is the most serious issue that is going on in my time in Dáil Éireann. Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle. I am very vexed about this.

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