Tax Code
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-29
============================================================

Simon Harris (FG), Wicklow

Quite frankly, we are considering the whole issue of energy in the round. We need to be truthful with people. I am not suggesting that the Deputy is not. We need to be truthful with people in relation to things like EU directives and how far we have gone. In fact, we have gone further, as the Deputy knows, than the EU directives and sought derogations in some cases already. We have also got to be honest with people, who rightly want us to be able to do a whole variety of things in the budget next week, that there is a limit to what we can do and what any government can do in relation to energy.
At the moment, as profiled by the financial resolutions passed in this House, the excise cuts are due to be reversed starting in November. That will not happen. As a Government, we have agreed to provide clarity and certainty for people for the winter months. There are also other pressing issues that the Deputy and others have highlighted around home heating oil, gas and perhaps the carbon tax that is applied in relation to that. There are limits in relation to that too under the ETS2 derogation, but there is room to do stuff.
There are lots of ways of helping people with energy and cost of living and some of them are not related to energy, such as things like income tax proposals and childcare costs. People do not look at what they have at the end of the week or month based on which Department did what. They look at the overall package that the Government brings forward and we will bring forward a range of cost-of-living measures next week.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-29/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-29