I move amendment No. 1: To delete all words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following: "notes that: — the Government is acutely aware of, and concerned about, the impact of rising prices on Irish households, and it is also aware of the high cost of energy prices and the wider impact of the cost of doing business for firms, particularly small firms; — in relation to Irish households, the Government has already taken the following measures; — €28.9 billion will be spent on social protection in 2026, including over €1.15 billion of new measures targeted to assist the most vulnerable in our society with the cost of living; — the supports provided in the budget package helps vulnerable households with the cost of energy bills, such as an increase in the Fuel Allowance scheme and extended eligibility to recipients of the Working Family Payment (WFP); — the increase of €10 in weekly social welfare primary payments is equivalent to approximately 4.1 per cent, and for pensions the increase is about 3.5 per cent, both above the rate of inflation; and — these increases follow on from the increase in payment rates in Budget 2025 that were also above the rate of inflation; recognises, with regard to disability: — that a Strategic Focus Network Summit on the Cost of Disability is being organised by the Department of Social Protection, and will involve disabled people and their advocates, as well as other Government Departments'; and — a public consultation process on how a cost of disability can best be delivered will be launched shortly; further notes, a second targeted tier of child benefit is being examined as a possible approach to reduce child poverty, but existing schemes like the Child Support Payment and the WFP are also available to achieve this end; further notes, in relation to energy prices, that: — Ireland has the twelfth highest electricity prices among the European Union (EU)-27, when adjusted for purchasing power parity according to Eurostat (H1 2025), and in nominal terms, Ireland ranks fifth for household electricity prices and eighth for gas prices among EU states; — electricity and gas markets in Ireland are commercial, liberalised, and competitive, the position of successive Governments is that competitive energy markets result in greater choice for consumers and businesses, in terms of suppliers, products and prices, and price setting by electricity suppliers is a commercial and operational matter for the companies concerned; — retail prices are influenced by several factors, including wholesale energy prices and supplier hedging, in Ireland, our long-standing reliance on fossil fuels, specifically gas, for electricity generation, has been a driver of higher energy costs, and furthermore, our geographical isolation, dispersed population, fossil fuel dependency and small market scale also influence prices and drive costs; — the Government has introduced a suite of measures over recent years to help households and businesses deal with the rising cost of energy, including €1,500 in electricity credits to all households through four Electricity Costs Emergency Benefit Schemes, at a cost of €3.3 billion, this is in addition to one-off payments to support certain social protection payment recipients; and — the Government provides support for households through schemes, including, the Fuel Allowance, the Household Benefits Package and the Additional Needs Payment; affirms that: — as part of Budget 2026, the Government took action and provided significant supports to enhance energy affordability, including: — an increase to the Fuel Allowance as well as broadened eligibility for the payment; — an extension of the reduced Value Added Tax rate of 9 per cent, which is applied to gas and electricity to 2030; — a continuation of the €400 income tax disregard for certain profits arising from the micro-generation of electricity for a further three years to end 2028; and — an extension of the Accelerated Capital Allowances scheme for energy efficient equipment for businesses to 2030; — the Government is committed to taking decisive action to provide warmer, more comfortable homes, as part of our drive to support energy affordability, security, and sustainability, with over 60 per cent of total Government expenditure on residential retrofit over the period 2022-2025 was on homes at risk of energy poverty; — following approval at Cabinet last week, the Government has published a National Residential Retrofit Plan and an enhanced set of measures to increase the delivery and affordability of home energy upgrades, these measures will continue to make home energy upgrades more accessible and affordable and support more homes to be more sustainable and energy-efficient, reducing reliance on fossil fuels, and lowering energy costs for households; — a record capital allocation of €640 million has been provided for Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland residential and community energy upgrade schemes this year, and a further €140 million has been provided for the Local Authority Energy Efficiency Retrofit Programme; — the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) continues to have a range of customer protection measures in place including, a moratorium on disconnections for vulnerable customers, protections for those on financial hardship meters, minimum debt repayment periods and promotion of the vulnerable customer register; — the Government has also established the National Energy Affordability Taskforce (NEAT) to identify, assess and implement measures that will enhance energy affordability for households and businesses while delivering key renewable commitments and protecting security of supply and economic stability, and the NEAT Interim Report 2025 was published last November with an Energy Affordability Action Plan to be published in Q3 this year; — under the auspices of the NEAT, the CRU will lead on the Programme for Government commitment to 'commission an independent review into the speed and level of passthrough from wholesale prices to retail prices, with an additional assessment of the overall price dynamics and an overall focus on the competitiveness of the Irish economy'; — while electricity credits previously played an important role, it should be noted that, despite costing in excess of €3.3 billion, this measure did not permanently reduce the cost of electricity nor are they fiscally sustainable, therefore, the Government has prioritised measures which reduce energy costs in the long-run such as the €3.5 billion investment in Ireland's electricity grid infrastructure as part of the National Development Plan; and — the range of supports that were included in Budget 2026 are in line with the movement away from one-off measures, towards permanent supports with funding also provided to address structural issues such as retrofit and infrastructure; and in relation to the cost of doing business, notes that arising from the wider inflationary trends, Government has taken action to address fiscal and regulatory issues, including: — through the establishment of the Cost of Business Advisory Forum (the Forum), June 2025, and the publication of the Action Plan on Competitiveness and Productivity, September 2025; — both of these actions deliver on the Programme for Government commitments to support small business, enterprise and industries and to develop Government policy which focuses on the economic areas that fall within our domestic sphere of influence; — the Forum's purpose is to critically examine issues that can lead to higher costs for business in Ireland and review associated regulatory and infrastructural issues that merit a changed approach, at present, there are 24 member organisations who represent a broad section of Ireland's enterprise sector, including, Small and Medium Enterprises and Multinational Corporations, who regularly contribute to the work of the Forum, alongside active engagement and dialogue with a variety of State Agencies, Regulators, and Government Departments; — the Forum members adopted a comprehensive thematic workplan in June, 2025 and since then have met to consider a series of themes: — Energy Costs and Security of Supply; — Insurance Costs; — Planning and Infrastructural Delivery; and — Water Services and Wastewater; — there are a number of remaining meetings scheduled for Q1 2026, and these will focus on legal costs and regulation, reporting and compliance; — the Forum is in the process of drafting the final report, with an indicative date to present the report to Government in Q1 2026; — also in August 2025, the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) published an update to its 2023 high-level analysis of the grocery sector in Ireland, this analysis confirms that, while food prices have increased significantly in recent years in Ireland, competition is working effectively in the Irish grocery retail sector, notably, food price increases have generally remained below the EU average, which coincides with increasing competition in Ireland; and — the grocery retail sector remains a key market for the CCPC and it will continue to monitor and review the sector on a regular basis; and finally, in relation to the National Minimum Wage: — since 2020, an increase by 40 per cent, from €10.10 to today's rate of €14.15 an hour, following a €0.65 increase in Budget 2026, which amounts to an increase of 4.8 per cent; — in 2025, the minimum wage increased by over 6 per cent, following a significant uplift of 12 per cent, or €1.40 in the previous year; — these increases were and are well ahead of inflation and projected wage growth and have brought about substantial real wage growth for the lowest paid workers in our economy; and — our current rate of €14.15 an hour means that Ireland has the second highest minimum wage in the EU, second only to Luxembourg, and among the highest in the world, when adjusted for purchasing power standards, we have the fifth highest minimum wage in the EU.". I express my deepest sympathies to those affected today in such a tragic event. My heart goes out to the families affected and those who were seriously injured. I also acknowledge all the first responders who worked at the scene I am pleased to be here to discuss a Private Members' motion that attempts to address a number of issues to do with the cost of living in Ireland. The Government opposes this motion. I assure the House that the Government is acutely aware of the impact of rising prices and costs on Irish households and businesses. Our proposed amendment to the motion will confirm this. The areas raised in the motion are complex. We have to make sure that we do not do anything that might harm employment opportunities or have any unintended consequences for investment. I will set out tonight the progress the Government is making in tackling prices and the areas raised in the motion. The proposals in the motion are wide-ranging and extremely diverse cutting across several Departments. It addresses so many areas and issues that I cannot hope to cover them all in any depth this evening but I will do my utmost to address several of them. At the outset, it is important for me to highlight the performance of the Irish economy over the past few years. The economy has proven to be remarkably resilient in the face of a series of unprecedented shocks from Brexit to the pandemic to the war in Europe. Furthermore, the geopolitical environment has perhaps never been as uncertain and turbulent as it is today. Despite all of this, our economy has continued to grow and thrive with record numbers of people in work - over 2.8 million people went to work this morning - and record rates of labour market activity. Today's labour market numbers confirmed this. The unemployment rate in January of this year stood at 4.7%. Incomes have risen and continue to rise while inflation has fallen and is expected to remain at close to 2% this year. Nonetheless, several of the issues raised in the motion centre on prices and costs. We fully acknowledge the challenges posed by high inflation and high costs for our consumers and the enterprise sector. I also accept that inflation hits the least well-off the hardest. That is why the Government has been so proactive in introducing cost-of-living packages and attempting to ease burdens on households and businesses. While the annual rate of inflation last year averaged 2.1%, which is down from a peak rate of 8.1% in 2021, we have seen food prices as a source of inflationary pressure. This is reflecting market conditions, an integrated supply chain and prices for agricultural inputs such as fuel, feed and fertiliser. It is important to note that food price inflation averaged 3 9% in 2025, which is down from 9.8% in 2023. On the issue of energy costs and prices, it is the case that a suite of measures was introduced in recent years to help households and businesses deal with the rising cost of energy. This included €1,500 in electricity credits to all households through the emergency costs benefit scheme at a cost of €3.3 billion. This universal measure provided valuable on-bill support to nearly 2.3 million households. While previously, electricity credits played an important role, this measure at a cost in excess of €3.3 billion is neither fiscally sustainable nor did it provide long-term benefit. As part of budget 2026, the Government took action and provided significant supports to enhance energy affordability, including an increase to the fuel allowance, as well as broadened eligibility for the payment; an extension of the reduced VAT rate of 9%, which is applied to gas and electricity to 2030; a continuation of the €400 income tax disregard for certain profits arising from the microgeneration of electricity for a further three years to the end of 2028; and an extension of the accelerated capital allowances scheme for energy-efficient equipment for businesses to 2030. The CRU continues to have a range of customer protection measures in place, including a moratorium on disconnections for vulnerable customers, protections for those on financial hardship meters, minimum debt repayment periods and promotion of the vulnerable customer register. The Government also prioritised measures that reduce energy costs in the long run such as the landmark €3.5 billion investment in Ireland's electricity grid infrastructure approved by the Government in July 2025. This represents the largest single investment in the country's electricity network in the history of the State. A record capital allocation of €640 million has been provided for SEAI’s residential and community energy upgrade schemes this year. A further record allocation of €340 million has been committed to the warmer homes scheme, which provides fully-funded energy upgrades for low-income homes at risk of energy poverty. While I have just outlined specific supports that were introduced as part of budget 2026 in response to concerns about energy costs and prices, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the wider social protection elements of this important aspect. This year, the Department of Social Protection will spend €25.9 billion in social welfare expenditure supporting pensioners, carers, people with disabilities, jobseekers and families in every parish across our country. This expenditure will make a real difference to communities across the country. Over €1.15 billion of this sum is for new measures. At the heart of these new measures are across-the-board social welfare increases effective from last month to our pensioners and people of working age with core rates increasing by €10 - a level that more than matches inflation. The increase of €10 in the standard rate is equivalent this year to about 4.1% compared with the CSO’s latest annual inflation rate of 2.8% to December. For pensioners, the increase is about 3.5%, which, again, is ahead of inflation. These increases follow on from the increase in payment rates last year that were also above the rate of inflation. The measures contained in budget 2026 were designed to support the most vulnerable in our society. The budget package included the largest child support payment increase in the history of the State for primary social welfare recipients bringing the total annual value of the child support payment to €3,016 for each child under 12 and €4,056 for each child aged 12 and over. A second targeted tier of child benefit is being examined by the Department of Social Protection as a possible approach to reduce child poverty but existing schemes like the child support payment and the working family payment are also available to achieve this end. The Department of Social Protection is currently developing a successor strategy to the roadmap for social inclusion, which is the national poverty reduction strategy, for the period from 2026 to 2030. With regard to the disability sector, I assure the House that improving outcomes for disabled people is a top priority for this Government. Our determination to achieve this is reflected in the key programme for Government commitment to introduce a permanent annual cost-of-disability support payment. That will be provided through a dedicated disability unit that has been established through the Department of An Taoiseach. Progress will also be monitored and driven by the Cabinet committee on children, disability and education. We know that addressing the cost of disability is not a question of income support alone. The delivery of, and access to, services are important and key to this. It is also important to highlight the Government's continuing commitment to fair wages for the lowest paid workers in our economy, and we have seen real progress made by raising the national minimum wage in recent years by way of substantial increases. Since 2020, the national minimum wage has increased by 40% from €10.10 to today’s rate of €14.15 an hour, the second highest in the EU. Over the past number of years, these increases in the minimum wage were well ahead of inflation and have brought about substantial real wage growth for the lowest paid workers in our economy. With regard to some of the other motions around wealth tax, we do have a number of cases where wealth in Ireland is taxed. There is capital gains tax, capital acquisitions tax, local property tax and certain forms of stamp duty for property and shares for those who are in impacted. In conclusion, in the short time I had, I tried to highlight some of the areas raised by the Deputies. The Government is making very real progress in addressing the cost of living challenges. We are acutely aware of issues around rising prices on Irish households and our policies are very much focused on the data we have, notwithstanding the series of very challenging external developments.

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