THE GREEN PARTY believes that being in Government is the “right thing to do for the country” as it heads into a think-in focused on key Budget issues like energy.

At a think-in today in Co Clare, the Green Party will be looking at the year ahead with a particular focus on energy and the cost of living, chairperson Senator Pauline O’Reilly said.

In an interview with The Journal, Senator O’Reilly said that being in Government “isn’t always the easiest” but is “the thing that, we believe, is the right thing to do for the country”, outlining the Greens’ focus on pushing for measures that reduce pressures caused by the significant rises in the cost of living this year.

Political parties are holding think-ins this week and next week to convene members as a new Dáil term begins.

The Dáil and the Seanad are due to sit again on Wednesday for the first time after the summer recess, which was characterised by the controversy over Robert Troy’s – and then, to a lesser extent, Stephen Donnelly’s – errors in registering rental properties.

The government will want to refocus attention now on the Budget as it prepares to try to deliver cost of living measures that ease growing financial burdens on the public.

The think-ins are an opportunity for parties to gather their elected members to touch base on policy positions and the months ahead.

“We will be coming up to our [party] convention in November. It will be the first time since before the pandemic that we have an in-person convention – this will be a lead-in to that a couple of months out,” O’Reilly said in an interview with The Journal.

The Greens think-in comes a day after energy ministers from around the EU, including Climate Minister and Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, met in Brussels to discuss responses to soaring energy prices.

“A key focus, I think is fair to say, will be on what is coming out of that meeting and our thoughts around the Budget,” the senator said.

Where we are now is that we have gas companies setting the price of energy.”

O’Reilly said that European countries that were most reliant on Russian gas are facing a “much more difficult reality” even compared to Ireland’s situation, but that there has been a “knock-on impact on cost across Europe”.

“We need to see a decoupling of the energy companies, because at the moment, the renewable companies are having their prices set by gas companies and that means that that is then being picked up by the end consumer in all of the various countries.”

She said it is “no surprise to anyone that this is going to be a very challenging winter across all of the European countries, not just those in the EU but European countries in general because Putin is using gas as a weapon of war and we need to make sure that the other energy companies that he doesn’t control are not also being used in a way that is unfair to the public”.

“We want to make sure at the end of the day that we do absolutely everything to support our citizens and to bring down the cost as much as we possibly can from those talks.

“One way or another, we’re going to have a record Budget when it comes to supports, both universal and targeted, for people and their energy costs.

“Almost everybody is vulnerable to those costs because they haven’t planned for them.”

Shortly after the Budget, the government will experience a shake-up as Fine Gael’s Leo Varadkar takes over the role of Taoiseach from Fianna Fáil’s Micheál Martin in December for the second half of the government’s term.

On what the rest of the term holds for the Green Party, O’Reilly said: “I think what we have seen is that through Covid, a huge crisis for the country, and the inflation and the war that’s happened, that there have been a lot of challenges and that this government has shown that it is responsible and takes the steps necessary.”

“We want to see that people are protected and that is core to the Green Party, that sense of fairness and justice for everyone and protection of the most vulnerable. We want to see that that will continue for the next couple of years.”

She pointed to the sectoral ceilings on greenhouse gas emissions agreed before the Dáil recess and said it was “important to do that at the start of summer so that coming into the Budget, we will see measures put in place that will support what needs to be done to bring down our emissions”.

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“A lot has happened and there’s been a huge increase in the Budget on supports for public transport and active transport and we need to see all of that continue now in the second half of this term of the government,” she said.

“The government, I think, has its differences. Different parties have differences of opinion but I think that we have been working well and we would want to discuss how we can continue to have a relationship where it delivers what’s required on everything that’s in the programme for government.”

Asked whether the burden of some issues, such as energy, has fallen to the Green Party leadership moreso than other parties, O’Reilly said: “I think our focus has always been that being in Government isn’t always the easiest but it’s the thing that, we believe, is the right thing to do for the country.”

“So we focus on that as opposed to what other parties should be coming out with,” she said.

Another major source of interest in the Budget this year is on whether or not it bring a substantial change to the cost of childcare, which parents have stressed is causing huge financial strain.

A regulation announced this week by Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman is setting down for the first time a framework of minimum rates of pay for roles in the childcare and early learning sector, ranging from €13 an hour for practitioners to €17.25 for graduate managers.

“That funding was secured in last year’s Budget and also as part of that there was a freeze on increasing fees for parents,” O’Reilly said.

“We will hope for an increase in the Budget and that’s what Minister O’Gorman and the party will be asking from the Finance Minister for childcare, for a large childcare package.

“This will be the Budget that will support parents not just in a cost freeze but actually in supporting lowering the cost of childcare significantly – that will be our whole hope and I believe that will be something that people will bring to the think-in.”