Minister agrees that households should expect same electricity reductions as businesses

Household electricity customers are right to question why business customers are seeing a reduction in their electricity bills but domestic users are not, a Government Minister has said. 

Electric Ireland announced this week will reduce its electricity tariffs for small and medium enterprises in the Republic of Ireland by an average of 10% from next month.

In addition, gas prices for businesses are also set to fall by an average of 15%.

However, the energy provider said it is very difficult to project the trajectory of residential electricity and gas prices.

It did say it will continue to keep rates under review.

Detailed analysis of energy costs from the CSO last month showed that gas prices are up 86% on January 2022, with electricity up by 63% and home heating oil by 35%.

Minister for Enterprise Simon Coveney told RTÉ's Morning Ireland on Tuesday that that household customers would be justified in questioning the approach taken by Electric Ireland.

"Of course, it's welcome for businesses that electricity prices are going down by 10% and gas prices by 15%. But I think many households listening to that story yesterday on the radio will be asking themselves the question why isn't that applying to my bill? And I think that is that is a fair question to answer," he said.

Mr Coveney agreed that Minister for Finance Michael McGrath "was correct yesterday when he said that I think consumers and households would have a legitimate expectation now that the same would apply to them".

He added that it would be good to see reductions for hard-press households, also. 

"We want to see households benefiting from that change in market reality," he said.