I ask that colleagues join me in offering a warm céad míle fáilte to a delegation in Public Gallery, indeed all of those in the Public Gallery today, who are from the working party on general affairs of the Council of European Union, led by Mr. Philip Grant and Mr. Nigel Hutson. They are in Dublin for a meeting of the General Affairs Council and are being hosted in Leinster House by the Minister of State, Deputy Thomas Byrne. They are all very welcome.

On the other side of the Public Gallery, I believe we have fifth and sixth class students from Blessington Educate Together National School. They are all most welcome.

I now call Deputy Whitmore.

I welcome everyone to the Public Gallery, and give a special welcome to the fifth and sixth class students.

There are now more than 500,000 households in arrears on their gas and electricity bills. That number has never been higher and it is continuing to soar. Thousands of people all over the country are facing a cold and bleak winter and feel a rising sense of dread every single time a bill comes through their doors. Many of these people have never had problems paying bills before but now, despite scrimping and saving, they are simply unable to make their budgets go any further.

At the same time as more people go into arrears on their bills, the profits of energy companies are booming. Just last week, the ESB announced its profits for the first half of the year: they were up by €100 million. Its CEO is in line for a pay hike of an eye-watering €161,000. This gives some indication of the bonanza that energy companies are enjoying. This is all happening while their very own customers are going cold. This is not sustainable, it is not fair and it is not right. It is time that the Government stopped hand wringing and actually did something about it.

A windfall tax on the superprofits of energy companies needs to be introduced now to stop this immoral profiteering. This is money that could be used to provide support for those who need it most, a €400 targeted energy credit for low- and middle-income earners to give them some immediate relief from skyrocketing bills as they face into a very difficult winter. However, the budget needs to go much further than that. We all know that Trump caused the war in Iran and the global energy shocks that arose from it but it is the Government that has left households so exposed to these energy price shocks by failing to invest and to support them to become resilient and move away from fossil fuels. The Government has failed to invest in solar to the extent it should have. We should be front-loading investment in solar panels, which can be installed quickly and easily and bring costs down immediately. That would mean at least a saving of €450 on bills this year, next year and every year after. The Social Democrats have a solar for all plan that we are asking the Government to adopt. It would double the grants for solar panels, introduce a grant for battery storage and make solar panels free for households most at risk of fuel poverty. Finally, please roll out plug-in solar. That is what we need to see, namely, some ambition from this Government instead of the usual tinkering around the edges.

Does the Tánaiste agree that it is immoral for energy companies to make windfall profits during an energy crisis? Will the Government introduce a windfall tax on their superprofits?

I thank the Deputy. The Tánaiste to respond.

Will the Government introduce a €400 energy credit for low- and middle-income families and radically ramp up solar?

I join Deputy Whitmore in welcoming our constituents from Blessington Educate Together National School. It is good to have them all here.

There are a couple of points I want to respond to. I believe there is significant merit in a windfall energy tax. This is not just me commenting on it, as I chaired a meeting on it in Dublin Castle last week with all of my European counterparts. We have tasked the European Commission with doing a body of work and reporting back to the Economic and Financial Affairs Council, ECOFIN - the meeting of European finance ministers - which will take place, from my memory, on the Thursday and Friday of budget week. It is best to approach these issues at a European level. That is how we approached it in the past when the Deputy will recall that we legislated for a framework and put in place a tax at the start of the Ukraine situation after the brutal, illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine. There are some companies that are benefiting very significantly from profits, not because they are enterprising or innovative, but just because the Strait of Hormuz is shut. Therefore, there is a compelling case. Working at a European level is important, but that is not a long-term comment. The Commission is due to report back to ECOFIN on the Thursday and Friday of budget week.

Deputy Whitmore's party has put forward proposals on how to help people through this winter period and beyond with their energy costs. There will be an energy package in the budget. There will be some temporary measures to help people with the here and now and this winter. However, I agree that there also need to be some measures to help people more permanently. The details of that are for budget day but the Deputy heard the Minister for energy yesterday giving an indication of a number of proposals that he intends to bring forward on battery storage and a scrappage scheme for boilers.

Quite frankly, we are seeing people go gangbusters on solar panels and electric vehicles, EVs. We see it in our own community and in the data that is coming through. However, we still need to see if there is more we can do to help accelerate that because people are trying to make decisions in the here and now in their own lives to reduce their bills. People are full of common sense. We need to make it as easy as possible for them to make those decisions too. There are things we need to do in the here and now. I know the Social Democrats also voted this way on temporary excise reductions and what we do on home heating. I would make the point that the fuel allowance is already a targeted energy support. It will kick off from next Monday. We accept that, going into this winter period, energy prices will probably be the number one concern on the minds of people in this country and we will come forward with a comprehensive package of measures in the budget in 12 days' time.

I thank the Tánaiste and I welcomed hearing the Minister talking about battery storage. It would have been better if the Government had not removed the battery storage grant in 2022 when Ukraine was invaded. That would have assisted.

A lot of people have put in solar, but there are many hundreds of thousands of people who cannot afford to do it. It is those people who are really struggling. It is the low-to-middle-income earners who are finding it hard to move away from fossil fuels because they are not getting enough support from the Government. Rather than throwing good money hand over fist at these short-term, emergency, temporary measures that are incredibly costly and leave us with nothing to show for them at the end of the day, it would be better if all those billions of euro given in energy credits previously were actually doing their job and we did not have nearly 330,000 people in arrears on their electricity bills or 188,000 people in arrears on their gas bills.

I thank the Deputy. The Tánaiste to respond.

They do not work. We need to insulate homes. That entails a long-term strategy and long-term investment.

I agree, and then I have a point of difference. I agree that there are lots of people out there who want to make the transition in their own lives and are still finding the gap too large. I was at the ploughing championships and met representatives of the Irish Farmers Association, IFA, in the IFA tent on this. Often, farmers are pitted against climate action but there are many farmers saying they want to put solar on their buildings and they need more support through the targeted agriculture modernisation scheme, TAMS. These are active issues we need to look at.

We need to do both, though. We need to help with the here and now, too. I will say to people right across the country that the measures we help them with, albeit they are classified as temporary in terms of trying to somewhat suppress the growth in energy prices, have a positive inflationary effect on the economy. Officials and economists in my Department estimate that the measures we have put in place to help reduce energy prices somewhat with excise reductions and the like have not been wasted measures and have actually kept down inflation by approximately 0.6%.

Officials and economists in my Department estimate that the measures we have put in place to help reduce energy prices somewhat, with the excise reductions and the likes, certainly have not been wasted measures but, rather, have actually kept down inflation by approximately 0.6%. When someone is shopping in the supermarket tonight with their basket of goods, that food would have cost approximately 0.6% more had we not taken these measures. We need to do both. However, I fully accept that we are facing the second energy shock in the European Union in half a decade and we need to transition much more quickly.