asked the Minister for Industry and Commerce if he will state (a) the total amount to date of the capital for all purposes made available to the Electricity Supply Board; (b) the total amount of repayment of capital made to date by the Electricity Supply Board; and (c) the amount paid by way of interest.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Capital of Electricity Supply Board.
The total advances received by the board from the Central Fund up to the 31st March, 1944, amounted to £13,621,860. The total of that capital repaid at the 31st March, 1944, amounted to £335,908. The amount paid by way of interest to date in respect of the foregoing advances totals £7,778,789.
In order to meet the present situation, would the Minister not consider allowing the Electricity Supply Board to go back again to the position it enjoyed originally of not having to pay interest on certain charges, and thereby relieve consumers of electricity from the inequitable position that they are in at the moment?
That is a question for the Minister for Finance. He has to pay the interest in any event.
The Minister is aware that in the initial period of the undertaking the Electricity Supply Board were permitted to carry on without having to pay interest charges.
The Deputy's suggestion amounts to this: that the taxpayers in general should subsidise the cost of electricity to electricity consumers.
The Minister is aware that in the early stages of the electricity undertaking the general taxpayer did that. Exceptional circumstances have now arisen which are causing great hardships to certain classes of the community. The Minister might consider which would be the lesser hardship: whether he should not give, for the present period, a remission of the interest charges which the Electricity Supply Board has to pay.
The majority of the taxpayers have neither electricity, gas nor paraffin oil throughout the country, and I think it would be unfair to ask them to pay a subsidy to the comparatively few people who have got the benefit of electricity supply, however reduced it may be.
Surely the Minister is misrepresenting the case?