Energy Poverty: DFI invited to speak at Department stakeholder event

On Friday 7 July, DFI attended the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications’ first Energy Poverty Action Plan Stakeholder Event.

We were one of four civil society speakers, along with SVP, ALONE and National Traveller MABS, highlighting groups who are particularly at risk of energy poverty.

DFI's Senior Policy Advocate, Fleachta Phelan, and disability activist Carolyn Akintola spoke to the 100+ attendees about disability poverty, the extra Cost of Disability (including higher energy and fuel costs), and the need for targeted measures to support disabled people, especially in Budget 2024. We also participated in a workshop on ‘Meeting the Cost of Energy’.

Is energy poverty coming up in your work, and are the disabled people you support struggling to pay their bills? We’d love to hear more from members about the level of need, so we can reflect that in our advocacy. If you’re interested to know more about this area of our work, do drop a line to Fleachta.

You can read the government’s Energy Poverty Action Plan here, and the joint civil society statement on Energy Poverty that DFI helped draft recently here.

ENDS