Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
LAST UPDATE | 6 Sep 2022
LOCAL AUTHORITIES ARE looking at the issue of Christmas lights on streets this winter amidst the growing energy crisis, Energy Minister Eamon Ryan has said.
Speaking ahead of a coalition leaders meeting this evening, the minister said he will bring a memo to Cabinet tomorrow on the management of energy consumption by the public sector, households and businesses.
He told reporters today that it will “start with the public sector” by setting temperature limits and consolidating buildings.
When asked about this year’s Christmas lights for cities, towns and villages across the country, the minister said it is something the Government will “come back to” later in the year.
He added: “I think local authorities are starting to look at that, they’re starting to consider every measure, but we’re not being prescriptive at that level yet.”
Speaking on RTÉ’s Prime Time tonight, Ryan said he could not guarantee that power blackouts can be avoided this winter.
Ryan said there are a number of different factors which will determine energy supply, including the performance of an older fossil fuel plant that wasn’t available when needed in recent years.
“I think the blackouts will depend, more than anything else, on the availability of that fossil fuel plant, where we’ve had difficulties. But one of the ways to avoid that is being clever in reducing our use. And that will, not only, give us security benefits, it will also help cut the bills,” Ryan said.
I think the blackouts will depend, more than anything else on the availability of that fossil fuel plant, where we’ve had difficulties. But one of the ways to avoid that is being clever in reducing our use. And that will, not only we have us security benefits, it will also help cut the bills.
Government sources said they would be very reluctant to give advice on such a measure as curtailing Christmas lights, stating that there will be questions about “how much of this is virtue signalling”, reiterating that it is unlikely Ireland will experience blackouts or brownouts this winter.
Speaking further about tomorrow’s Cabinet tomorrow, Ryan said it is only really the start to addressing a whole range of actions.
“It will be one of a series of memos to manage what’s going to be a very difficult situation in energy. And I think, yes, we just start by example, in the public sector, to start in our own use of energy in the public sector, particularly our buildings,” he said.
The Government’s Reduce Your Use campaign has been clear in how householders can reduce their use of power in a whole variety of different ways, he said.
“That will be strengthened and much more widely deployed,” he said, adding that it will be about helping businesses as well as households.
However, he said the message will also be about “maintaining your comfort”.
“The important message going out to our households this winter is stay warm,” he said, adding that householders will be asked to be “clever” and not “wasteful” with their energy usage.
When asked about heating in schools and libraries and whether they can expect curtailments, the minister said that in a crisis, places like libraries play a very critical role, with many people using them as social environments and places to stay warm.
“When it comes to libraries, don’t shut facilities that actually provide a really important social function in the middle of difficult times,” he said.
“I think we’re going to have to look at every single building and every single institution to look at their energy bills and look at how they use energy, because they’re going to be hit with higher gas and oil bills if that’s their heating system,” said Ryan.
However, he said “children benefit from being in school… we need our children in school”.
Ryan will meet with other European Union ministers for an emergency meeting on Friday.
The meeting could result in “really significant steps” to help address the energy crisis, he told reporters today.
“I’m hopeful we can get an agreement on Friday and very quickly the [European] Commission will then introduce measures that allow us to try and cushion some of the blow of those higher bills,” he said.
Some ideas on the table are revenue skimming of energy companies as well as the decoupling of the price of gas from the price of electricity.
Supports
Speaking in Offaly today, Taoiseach Micheal Martin has pledged to provide “substantial” supports as the public faces soaring energy prices.
Martin said that energy prices have risen to levels that were not expected, blaming Putin’s war in Ukraine for creating the energy and food crisis.
The cost-of-living package will be announced alongside the Budget at the end of the month.
Martin said the country has to work together to reduce energy demand.
He would not be drawn on whether the Government will consider capping energy prices.
“The Government will be assisting people and will be helping people in terms of alleviating cost pressures on people, and we will do that through supports like we did last year,” he added.
“This year we will have a cost-of-living package parallel with the Budget, which will be once-off in terms of its application for this year which will help people, households, particularly families.
“Then the Budget itself will also to deal with, as best it can, issues like childcare and education and so on.
“Schools will need supports to deal with the cost of energy in schools. Clearly, government will help in all of that.
“We will go as far as we possibly can, in terms of resources we have and ensure we don’t make the inflation situation worse.”
He said the cost-of-living budget package will contain “substantial supports”.
“It will be a substantial package as it has to be because the price levels are at a level that no-one has experienced before, not even in the 1970s,” he added.
“It’s principally because of the decision by (Vladimir) Putin to weaponise energy and the war in Ukraine is having an impact. This is the first time since World War Two that we have had a major war of this kind on the continent of Europe.
“It has created the worse humanitarian crisis since World War Two, it’s created an energy crisis and a food crisis and that is the reality of a horrible and brutal war, that’s why Europe has united against that war.”
Martin said the government is doing all it can within its resources to incentivise the the retrofitting of homes.
He claimed there has been a 300% increase in applications for retrofit grants.
“Many companies involved in retrofitting have witnessed a very strong demand in growth,” he added.
With reporting by Press Association
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Remember folks. Pat gallagher didnt vote two days ago on whether to release the letter from the ecb to Brian lenihan which ff, fg, labour and the esb have been trying to keep from us since 2010. When that letter is finally released in the coming days/weeks watch them all go “independent” ff/fg/labour
Yes trevor sinn fein were the only party to vote for the release of the letter. Fg and labour voted against. Wonder if rte reported that.
With good reason. Sensitive financial information that could undermine our recovery or cause instability in our dealings with the markets or the ECB.
You are hardly going to trust a person you have to work with if private correspondence is published.
Ah seanie i do enjoy your posts. What is the official ff line on this letter? The cope didnt vote and the ombudsman ruled it should be published.
Get back in your box Seanie…FF Fluffer
I’m from Donegal and if Gallagher says his main priorities are ‘to bring jobs to the northwest’ then I don’t see the point in his last 13 years work or do I see the point in his highly paid position even being available.
If I had a vote tomorrow on being able to leave the eu, I’d be voting to leave it.
The last thing we need in Europe at the moment is people from Fianna Fail ‘representing’ us. Hopefully the people in the Midlands-North West region will be wise enough to not vote for these two.
Do we want FG, Labour, SF or the Looney left representing us?
There may be a variance in political rhetoric while they’re rifling through our pockets, but they’re all much the same.
What we have is a political deficit that dwarfs our fiscal deficit.
We need people like Thomas Byrne standing up for Ireland in Brussels.
Thomas has wonderful experience from his time in the Seanad and Pat knows the workings of the EU.
Pity they’re both FF rats.
Tell me Seanie, is Thomas Byrne in favour of the property tax and water charges? Yes or no?
Thomas was a TD in the 2007/11 regime that betrayed our freedom to the Nazi EU. Thomas stands for venture capitalism and is a “money man” has no interest in the ordinary man and the damage caused by the FF regime and longs for the halsyon days of greed and capitalist pillage to return.
As someone from the constituency i have no idea what pat the cope gallagher ever done for that area. He is never in the media for having done or said anything. As for the other muppet, the people gave him their answer in 2011. If im in the country my vote will go to matt carthy.
Another spiv like Brian Crowley below in Cork, who only pops up oozing insincerity at voting time. Smallest FF logo ever, into the bargain.
@Amphroaí My dear fellow when you blossomed onto this forum a number of weeks ago – it was your effervescent use of the queens English which was so refreshing, scintillating and incandescent – it is such a shame to see you delve into the crassness of the tongue of the ordinary peasants.. Is there not a more rhythmic way to describe the delinquent character of the ruling class than ‘spiv’?
Perhaps the heroics of the Irish team have rendered your vocabulary into to a more ‘rustic’ overture. You of course subscribe to the notion that the traditional allocation of executive responsibilities has always been so determined as to liberate the ministerial incumbent from the administrative minutiae by devolving the managerial functions to those whose experience and qualifications have better formed them for the performance of such humble offices, thereby releasing their political overlords for the more onerous duties and profound deliberations which are the inevitable concomitant of their exalted position?
On reflection, my dear fellow interlocutors, you are most assuredly correct. I can only crave your collective pardons for my tardy, untimely, and gradual yet interminable descent into crass generalities, truncated and incisive, yet trivial and inelegant, and undertake forthwith to apply a greater burden of thought and alacrity to my wordy ejaculations herein than I have been in the habit of imparting upon such outpourings in the recent past.
I thank you for your candour, sir.
Good to see service resumed old boy… i pray those ‘wordy ejaculations’ are never directed against my humble self. Carry on.
Indeed, I have been perhaps overly liberal in my enjoyment of the pleasures of Bacchus in the last single digit measure of quarterly portions to cycles of the moon. I have been of late enjoying the triple banquet of bloodsport that has been presented for my delectation by the onset of local elections, Six Nations rugby football tournaments and the wedding of my sister.
I fear I am still in the early stages of recovery from the latter two, while relishing the inevitable unfolding of the former.
Never, dear sir. I reserve my lengthy salvos for those who deserve them.
Deadly :-)))))
What the people of Midlands-North West region want to hear from Pat ‘ The Cope’ Gallagher and Thomas Byrne is where do they stand on the Property/Bondholder Tax and on water charges. During the Meath bye-election Byrne was asked about the property tax and gave a vague answer. His refusal to condemn property tax and Fianna Fáil’s refusal to give a commitment to scrap it cost Byrne that election. The people want to hear it loud and clear from Fianna Fáil now, no if’s, no buts, no maybe – are you in favour of property tax and water charges?
Pat the dope Gallagher ,is that what they said or was that the voters
Pat Gallagher isn’t as catchy I suppose.
It came from Co-Op the family had the co-Op there years ago. It was used to differentiate between Gallagher families
So he’s really Pat “co op” Gallagher!!
They probably can’t up with the nickname themselves. I doubt they care but I refuse to humour them by using it.
Genuine question here, is he allowed to put his Nickname on the ballot paper? I would hope not
More like “Can’t Cope” , except when it comes to claiming salary , and expenses!
After everything that has gone before, there has to be something inherently wrong with someone who votes for FF.
Dumb and Dumber
Yawn.
FF. How the mighty have fallen You’d wonder whether some of their new recruits were dropping leaflets in or casing the joint
I don’t think anyone will be breaking in to your council house, Susanna. Unless ur shinner buddies are in the area.
Huh?
Seanie, with the greatest respect in the world, many Fianna Fail supporters down through the years lived in local authority housing and many still do, that was where the core support of the party was based for many years, slightly facetious comment
And seanies assumptions are based on ?
The Cope is off to a good start.
140 jobs lost in Gweedore, on his doorstep.
PS “Cope” is pronounced to rhyme with “Dope”
Starters orders. And off they go.
Fianna Fáil destroyed Ireland economically!
Fianna Fáil gave “cover” to many dishonest politicians who deceived the Irish Electorate election after election since the foundation of the Irish State!
” I won the money at the horses”!
Paddy the plasterer bought my house!
Remember Haughty, Lawlor, Callely to name but a few!
Michael Martin set up the HSE which has cost the country Billions of Euro!
Are…..tossers
Not really the newest.
have your say