Windfall Tax on the Excess Profits of Energy Companies: Motion [Private Members]
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-30
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Barry Heneghan (IND), Dublin Bay North

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta Whitmore agus leis na Daonlathaithe Sóisialta as an rún seo a chur chun tosaigh. Tá sé an-tábhachtach go mbíonn go leor cainte faoi chúrsaí fuinnimh sa Teach seo. Tá a fhios ag an Aire Stáit go bhfuil mé an-ghnóthach sa réimse seo.
I understand the intention and I thank Deputy Whitmore and the Social Democrats. Bringing this to the House is what we should be doing. We need to speak about everything to do with energy and what we can be doing. I know from listening to Deputy Whitmore at the committee that she is solution focused.
I welcome my engagement with the Minister and what the Independents are pushing for. We want lower bills and, of course, we also need to introduce an emergency measure that copies what we did in 2022, which is the right way to achieve that. From the negotiations, the legal basis on which the Minister of State is arguing needs to be examined.
We had the EU Commissioner in yesterday. I understand we must avoid unintended consequences for investment but we also need to look at other things we can do with taxation. I welcome my engagement with the Department and internally regarding energy in battery storage, plug-in solar and my Bill on private wires. I look forward to working with the Government in alleviating and allowing large energy users, LEUs, to supply their own energy more easily.
We need to look at energy sharing in communities and establishing more DSOs across the network and focus on how other countries have solved the problem. At present, we have an issue where we have one sheriff in town when we could have hundreds like Germany where there is a single person responsible who can say, "This town needs more gas. This town needs more storage." We should have a single officer in those areas who can establish and lower the costs.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-30/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-30