Is fíor a rá gur chaith Rialtais Fhianna Fáil agus Fhine Gael go holc le ceantair tuaithe ar fud an Stáit thar na blianta. Léiríonn an dóigh ar láimhseáil an Rialtas an stoirm is déanaí an cás seo arís. Le rudaí a dhéanamh níos measa, tá na bodaigh mhóra i mBord Soláthair an Leictreachais anois ag rá go gcaithfidh gnáthdhaoine na tíre seo, daoine a bhí fágtha gan leictreachas, billí níos airde a íoc chun an damáiste a chóiriú. Caithfear stop a chur leis seo. It is fair to say that both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments have successively given a raw deal to rural Ireland throughout the years. At times, rural communities have been treated as almost second-class citizens. With the formation of their most recent Government, we see that the sidelining of rural Ireland and the west continues, with just one Minister from all of Connacht and Ulster and no Minister from the Border counties at all. Well done. The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have together managed to pull off perhaps the most east-coast-centric Government ever.

While rural people are well used to getting the cold shoulder from the Government, we have seen this disrespect and marginalisation in its sharpest, most disastrous form in the aftermath of the most recent storm. The Government's sluggish and shoddy response to the devastation and hardship caused by the storm in rural Ireland says it all. Its failure to treat it as a national crisis meant communities were left with significant difficulties just to meet basic needs. That was to be seen right across rural Ireland. Many experienced real isolation in the absence of power, water, light, heat and telecommunications. Apart from the heroic efforts of ordinary workers, community activists and those in our local authorities and utility companies, the reality is that most communities had to fend for themselves as the Government failed to grasp the severity of the situation.

The reason we see this slack response from the Government is because rural communities and those who live there simply do not matter in the eyes of this Government. That sense of abandonment and anger is very real. To add insult to injury, we now have the top brass of the ESB effectively bullying those who suffered the most. It beggars belief that the CEO of the ESB came out and said that its customers would have to foot the bill for damage to the network caused by the storm. This is the head of a company which made profits of €898 million in 2023 telling people in rural Ireland, many of whom went without electricity for two weeks, that they have to cough up in the form of higher bills. What planet is he living on? Let me be clear, it is the ESB who should be compensating customers for the amount of time they went without power. To fund the repair of the network, the CEO's first port of call needs to be the massive profits the ESB has accumulated through ripping off customers with some of the highest electricity prices in the EU in recent years.

People are really angry about this. The top brass of the ESB need a wake-up call and the people are asking why the Government is not giving it to them. Clearly, the head honchos of the ESB are not prepared to let a good crisis go to waste in boosting profits. The Government needs to come off the bench in this. The Tánaiste needs to get on the pitch to start protecting people from the impact of this storm and to ensure the storm is not used as an excuse by the ESB to gouge customers even further. What does that mean? It means hauling in the senior management of the ESB, sitting them down and making it very clear to them that those whose lives have been rocked by this storm are not the people who are going to be forced to fork out in order to cover up the failures and mismanagement of the ESB in the first instance. Indeed, the ESB should be compensating those customers who were left without electricity, many for up to two weeks.

I thank Deputy Doherty for raising this important question. There is no doubt this storm has caused significant chaos and hardship in many parts of this country, and disproportionately so in the west and north-west of the country; the Deputy is right in that regard. We are all collectively relieved in Ireland, most particularly those communities, that the power is finally back. I know that Deputy Doherty will join me in saying that the Trojan work carried out by workers from the ESB, local authorities, Uisce Éireann and others, on the front line in assisting people has been very important. We should commend and thank them for that.

I wish to make one point, which I said last week. The comments of the chief executive of the ESB, which were perhaps said in a moment of haste or error, were insensitive. I welcome that he was big and decent enough to come out, acknowledge that himself and apologise for the insensitivity of those comments. That is important. In public life, any of us can say something in error or something that is insensitive but it is important to put your hands up afterwards and say that it could have been said in a much better way.

We can come back another day to debate the ministerial presence in the west and north west. In the interests of time, I will not name all my colleagues who serve with diligence in a variety of roles in government. I will come back to that issue another day because we should not actually make the storm a point of political division. In fact, what I have seen over the past number of weeks is this Government working with people the length and breadth of Ireland. Indeed, Sinn Féin ministers were on to me looking for assistance from the Government to help with the storm situation in Northern Ireland because this storm was not partisan. This was a storm that involved everybody who held office putting their shoulder to the wheel and working with agencies and communities in the interest of trying to keep people safe.

I must say that a lot was done right. We have to be conscious that because there was a red weather warning alert, lives were definitely saved in Ireland. In saying that, I, of course, think and acknowledge the loss of the life of Kacper Dudek in the Deputy's constituency. The warning system, however, worked. What we need to get much better at is preparedness and resilience at a community level. If we are being honest with each other, there are parts of the country, even counties that were badly affected, that did better than others in being prepared at that local level by having access to generators and having their local management plans. As part of the Government's review which will kick off shortly, we will need to look at what needs to be done at that local level to build up preparedness. Today, the Taoiseach and I have convened a meeting of relevant Government Ministers to begin to look at exactly how we better prepare for the next storm and for more adverse weather conditions in the future.

As for the financial side, because the Deputy referenced the financial situation, the Minister, Deputy Dara Calleary, who is from the west, led with the Government's humanitarian assistance scheme in which we provided significant financial assistance to many thousands of people to try to help them in a desperately difficult situation, in which the lights were not on and people were trying to still feed and mind children or older people and fulfil care needs. A lot was done and there is a lot of work to do in this regard. I am very clear that the ESB should not - and will not - be gouging any customers on this matter. It has significant resources. The Government also intends to invest significant resources in improving infrastructure. We all, that is, every State agency, commercial or otherwise, Department and every local authority, need to now take the lessons of this storm and be more prepared for future weather events.

It is not a case of whether the ESB will be gouging people in the future. The ESB has been gouging customers for years. People in the Tánaiste's constituency, in my constituency and right across this State pay among the highest electricity costs in Europe. The ESB made profits of €898 million in the last calendar year we have available. That is a significant amount of profit. In the first 18 months, €1.3 billion has been transferred by individuals paying their electricity bills to the ESB. There are serious amounts of costs in terms of ESB bills, not just in terms of running costs and standing charges. While the CEO of the ESB said his comments were insensitive, he has not ruled out that these costs will be borne by customers in 2026. I am asking the Tánaiste to stand up for people who were left without electricity for weeks on end and to make it clear to the ESB top brass that there will be no increases as a result of this. Not only that, but we also expect the ESB to compensate people. Remember, during the term of the last Government, the ESB was fined €37 million for failures in supply. It needs to start compensating people and show some humility.

Will the Tánaiste call the top brass of the ESB and make those points to them?

Hear hear.

I thank Deputy Doherty. The long and the short answer is yes, we will be engaging with the ESB. We will also, in line with our programme for Government commitment, be engaging on the issue of energy costs overall. I can point to a number of measures the previous Government took and that this Government will be taking in respect of assisting people with their energy costs. People will remember that the previous Government took a number of measures around energy credits in order to assist people, in the here and now, with the cost of bills. The Deputy will be aware that these were welcomed by his constituents, by mine and by people right across the country.

The Deputy will know that in the programme for Government we have also made commitments to keep the lower rate of VAT on energy bills and providing people with certainty for the period ahead. These are the practical measures we are taking right now to assist people with bills which can be large and which can make people feel financially insecure. Government will have a conversation with all State agencies and actors regarding energy prices going forward. We are happy to constructively engage on that.