The number of households in arrears on their electricity bills rose to the highest level on record in April, according to latest figures from the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU).
A total of 322,298 customers were in arrears for the month, a small increase on the March figure (318,735).
This represents 14% of all domestic electricity customers.
Of those households behind on their electricity bills, 186,380 are more than three months in arrears.
The CRU began collecting data on customer arrears in 2016, and at the end of that year 271,173 (around 13% of the total) households were in arrears on their electricity bills.
Meanwhile, the number of domestic gas customers in arrears has also been steadily rising in recent months, reaching 185,940 households in April.
Sinn Féin MEP Lynn Boylan said the latest arrears figures are “another stain on the record of this Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Government.
She said: “There are more people struggling to pay their bills now than at any point since before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
“The best they could come up with was another taskforce. Well there are now almost 24,000 more households behind on bills since the Government announced its taskforce talking shop in June last year.
“The next big idea was to axe the energy credits in the absence of evidence that the need had gone away. But there are almost 22,000 more households behind since the Government pulled the rug out from households by cancelling the energy credits in Budget announced last October.”
Ms Boylan added the Government “got approval from the EU for a €300 million subsidy for big business. That’s the same cost as giving every household an energy credit of €125”.
“The energy regulator announced how households will face a €41 spike in the cost to fund grid upgrades, while data centres will get a €150,000 discount.
“It’s scandalous that the Government continues to greenlight data centres despite them pushing our electricity prices to the highest in Europe and hundreds of thousands of households behind in their bills,” she said.
