Fuel Poverty Getting Worse – Crowe<\/p>\n
Dublin South West representative Se\u00e1n Crowe TD has said that the Government’s promise to tackle fuel poverty isn\u2019t happening and called on the them to use Budget 2014 to give some comfort to families unable to heat their homes and\u00a0 make ends meet.<\/p>\n
Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe TD said:<\/p>\n
\u201cAccording to the St. Vincent de Paul the average cost of energy bills has increased by \u20ac500 per year.<\/p>\n
\u201cFuel poverty is an issue that has yet to be taken seriously by \u2018the powers that be\u2019 in Ireland and price increases will do nothing to alleviate the growing problems that more and more people are now facing and with winter almost on us.<\/p>\n
\u201c The real life experiences are truly heart-breaking.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn my own constituency of Dublin South West, I\u2019ve met young mothers who are literally terrified of the approaching winter months and the cost of trying to heat their home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have also spoken to fathers currently experiencing wage cuts and tax hikes and who are seeing their heating bills spiral out of control.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany of these struggling families are being left with an unenviable choice between feeding their children or pay for larger and larger energy bills. They also talked of the long sleepless nights that accompany prospect of a new energy bill.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery year hundreds of people over the age of 65 are dying because of lack of heat in their homes. One survey has shown that half of older people go without food or clothing in order to meet the costs of heating their homes.<\/p>\n
“Is this acceptable or even right in the Ireland of 21st Century<\/p>\n
\u201cUnfortunately the Government\u2019s failure to respond has deepened the crisis for many of\u00a0 these individuals and their families.<\/p>\n
\u201cMinisters have already cut the smokeless fuel supplement, increasing the cost of living in many urban areas.<\/p>\n
“Government has also cut the fuel allowance by six weeks wrenching \u20ac120 out of the pockets of families struggling to pay fuel bills. They shamelessly sat back and did nothing as the Regulator hiked up gas and electricity costs.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the big question is following this latest report from the St Vincent De Paul is, how Government will use Budget 2014 to help these hard pressed families.<\/p>\n
\u201cWill they do what is clearly right or will they continue on a path that is increasing hardship and poverty amongst the most vulnerable.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fuel Poverty Getting Worse – Crowe Dublin South West representative Se\u00e1n Crowe TD has said that the Government’s promise to tackle fuel poverty isn\u2019t happening and called on the them to use Budget 2014 to give some comfort to families unable to heat their homes and\u00a0 make ends meet. Deputy Se\u00e1n Crowe TD said: \u201cAccording […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1016"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1109,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions\/1109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seancrowe.ie\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}