Many people in Louth and Meath are really struggling to pay their energy bills, Drogheda TD Joanna Byrne of Sinn. Fein has revealed.
That is the feedback she is regularly getting from callers to her new constituency offer and is demanding the Government do something to help people with their electricity and gas bills in the October Budget.
She made her comments as new figures released today showed over 300,000 people nationwide are in arrears on their energy bills – one of the highest ever.
The Government has initially said there will be no energy credits to help struggling families in the Budget unlike previous years.
Deputy Byrne said:” Households right across my constituency and beyond are paying some of the highest energy bills anywhere in Europe.
Rising energy prices are heaping more pressure on already struggling families that I meet in my constituency office.
“Information provided by my colleague Sinn Fein MEP Lynn Boylan shows a record 301,379 households are in energy arrears. This is the highest number ever recorded.
“We are now in a situation where big energy companies are intent on hiking up their energy costs making huge profits and the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities (CRU) is preparing to hike the network costs that households have to pay but cut them for the Data Centres.
“The Government can not stand idly by and continue to claim that these issues are outside their control but they are not. These are political decisions.”
She called on the Government to start sharing the energy burden by scraping the cut in costs for the Data Centres and to bring in badly needed financial support to help families and small businesses in the forthcoming Budget.
Deputy Byrne added:” The Budget must include energy credits as part of a cost of living package to reduce the pressure households are facing and extend the reduced VAT on electricity and gas bills until the end of the year.”
