Martin and McDonald clash over cost of electricity
By Cillian Sherlock, PA
The Taoiseach has defended the Government’s approach to energy costs, as he was told households are being “ripped off”.
Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said more than a million households will be hit “with big hikes in their electricity bills” this month as she accused energy companies of “brazenly ripping off customers in Ireland”.
It comes after reports from the International Energy Agency found that retail prices in Ireland are three times higher than wholesale prices.
Ms McDonald said: “That’s price gouging, plain and simple. A rip-off, plain and simple.”
She said the report shows that energy companies are making “bumper profit” by refusing to pass on the drop in wholesale price to their customers.
People are sick of being ripped off. Highest electricity prices in Europe and prices going up for 1 million customers. This is crazy.
Report today proves what we have been saying energy companies are ripping people off and not passing on savings. Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil won’t…— Mary Lou McDonald (@MaryLouMcDonald) October 14, 2025
Speaking during Leaders’ Questions on Tuesday, Ms McDonald said this was “in keeping with the terrible budget” announced by the Government last week.
She said the budget “looks after those at the top and leaves ordinary workers worst off”.
“Winter now approaches, people will leave their lights and their heating on for longer, and the rip-off bills they receive will be a body blow for families.
“You’ve done nothing to help pay one single bill or to ease the pressure on households.
“People know for a long time that they are being gouged and ripped off on their energy bills, and you now have further proof of that fact.”
The Taoiseach defended the Government’s budgetary approach and accused Sinn Fein of an approach that would have undermined Ireland’s financial stability.
Micheal Martin said the budget was focused on those on the lowest incomes as well as investing in public services and infrastructure.
“Housing is the biggest single issue facing us, and the budget puts extraordinary resources into housing on top of what was provided in the National Development Plan.”
On the end of energy credits, he added: “I can recall during the energy crisis, the proposals that you came up with would have undermined our financial credibility and would have been a boon to the oil companies and to the fossil fuel companies.
“You wanted to underpin them, and if you keep on doing energy credits, where’s the pressure on the companies?
“What you’re suggesting is we keep bailing out the companies, we keep underpinning the gouging.
“Because if the companies think, if the companies think there’s going to be 200, 500, 1,000 euro [from energy credits] every year, that will get factored in without question.”
Mr Martin said the more fundamental issue was addressing how the single European market works in terms of how gas prices are determined.
He said Sinn Fein had copied former UK prime minister Liz Truss in calling for caps on energy prices, adding: “Thanks be to God we didn’t accept your proposal because look at what happened to prime minister Truss, the markets, the UK economy and everything else at the time.”
Ms McDonald also raised an ESRI report which found that budget 2026 tax and welfare measures result in average income losses.
However, Mr Martin said the methodology of the ESRI was “somewhat flawed” and he was more concerned with addressing deprivation and consistent poverty than “relative poverty” and indexing to inflation.
