Ireland's offshore wind targets in serious jeopardy, industry warns
The plan welcomed the progress made by government in recent years and calls for fast action in the delivery of policy commitments, with proper resourcing and funding to reflect the seriousness of the Government's commitment to the sector.
There are 24 targeted actions split across four delivery areas, which includes maximising the south coast Designated Maritime Area Plan (DMAP), including progressing the Tonn Nua site auction and the future development of sites Li Ban, Manannan and Danu; and building vital infrastructure, including investment in ports, grid capacity and industrial demand to support offshore wind growth.
Wind Energy Ireland chief executive Noel Cunniffe said: 'This plan is about restoring confidence – at home and abroad – in Ireland's offshore wind potential.
'We know what needs to be done. The industry stands ready to deliver, but it cannot do so without political urgency and whole-of-government leadership. The steps we set out today are not theoretical – they are essential.
'We are now in a decisive window. If we want offshore wind to play a central role in lowering consumer energy bills, securing Ireland's energy independence and cutting carbon emissions, we need a clear pathway forward. That means removing barriers, resourcing delivery and creating certainty for investors.
'The actions laid out in the plan will de-risk investment, accelerate planning and grid processes and ensure that critical infrastructure such as ports and grid access are available in time.'
The wind energy industry group said Irish wind farms provided 32% of Ireland's electricity in 2024.
The plan is being published to coincide with WEI's annual Offshore Wind Conference being held in Dublin on Tuesday and Wednesday.
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Telegraph
an hour ago
- Telegraph
Families facing ‘boiler tax' under Miliband's net zero drive
Families have been warned they face a £25 'boiler tax' as heat-pump manufacturers struggle to sell enough to avoid huge government fines. Boiler firms are set to be hit with a £30m bill for failing to meet Ed Miliband's quotas, with the cost of the penalties set to be passed on to consumers. The warning represents a direct challenge to the Energy Secretary, who has insisted the manufacturers will be able to sell enough heat pumps to avoid any penalties. Industry figures have long warned the high cost of installing the systems, plus the fact that they are unsuitable for many homes, means demand is too low. A spokesman for Mr Miliband's department said it 'did not recognise' the estimated fines and that it had set 'realistic sales targets'. It comes after he introduced new quotas that dictate the number of heat pumps that boiler manufacturers must install every year. The Energy Secretary pushed through plans initially drawn up by the Tories before they ditched them in the face of a consumer backlash. Under the net zero scheme, firms will be fined £500 for each unit they miss their target by, with the cost set to be passed on to families. The big-four manufacturers sell around 1.5 million units every year, meaning they would need to add £20 to the cost of each new boiler to recoup £30m in fines. Those companies are also facing several million pounds in administrative costs related to the targets, which will also be passed on to customers. That has led to the policy, formally known as the Clean Heat Market Mechanism, being branded a 'boiler tax' by the industry and political critics. The heat-pump quota for the first year of the scheme, which began in April, has been set at 6 per cent of a company's overall fossil-fuel boiler sales. But figures for the UK's four biggest boiler manufacturers – Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Ideal and Baxi – suggest the industry is running far behind its target. They only installed 5,000 eligible heat pumps between April and July, well short of the 23,500 they needed to sell to be on course to avoid fines. If those sales levels were to be replicated through the rest of the year the firms would fall about 60,000 short of their quota, resulting in £30m of fines. The Energy and Utilities Alliance, an industry body which conducted the analysis, said that would mean an average price increase of £25 per boiler. Mike Foster, from the Energy and Utilities Alliance, said that low consumer demand for heat pumps, which cost around £13,000 to install, was to blame. 'Supply of heat pumps has never been the issue, you can pick one up from your local merchant tomorrow, it is demand that is missing,' he warned. 'If you can't afford a heat pump but do replace your boiler, you are paying more now to keep warm and have hot water than you need to because of the boiler tax and the flaws in the scheme that have been built in by Whitehall. 'Heat pumps have a role to play in decarbonising homes but the burden should not fall on those who cannot afford or don't want one. 'Making boilers more expensive might appear to make heat pumps more attractive, I know that is the cunning Whitehall plan but it should not be the way we get to net zero.' Ministers are currently consulting on increasing the quota for the next year to between 8 and 10 per cent, which could see fines rise to £50m. That would see the family boiler tax increase to up to £40 based on current sales patterns. Manufacturers' efforts to hit their targets are being hampered by the design of the scheme, which only recognises some heat-pump sales. Only installations that are carried out under a specific certification scheme are counted by officials towards companies' targets. Urged to rewrite rules As a result, the big-four firms have sold 5,000 heat pumps over the past three months, which will not count towards their quotas and avoiding fines. The industry is now urging Mr Miliband to rewrite the rules so that all sales are counted. Heat pumps typically cost £13,000 to install, although families can claim a £7,500 government grant, bringing the price tag down to £5,500. Government officials said that sales under the officially recognised Microgeneration Certification Scheme rose by 63 per cent last year. A spokesman for the net zero department said: 'We do not recognise these figures, which also do not account for any increase in heat-pump sales next year. 'The British people are showing record demand for heat pumps and we are one of the fastest-growing markets in Europe. 'The Clean Heat Market Mechanism is setting realistic sales targets as we work hand in hand with industry to support the transition to clean heating for years to come. 'We are investing £13.2bn to upgrade up to five million homes this Parliament, including making heat pumps more affordable for households by providing £7,500 towards the cost through the Boiler Upgrade Scheme.'
Times
2 hours ago
- Times
How the top tax rate became a middle-class problem
When Gordon Brown's Labour government introduced a new top rate of income tax, fewer than one in every hundred taxpayers had to worry about it. However, the number of workers liable for the additional rate is predicted to surge to 1.7 million by 2030 — more than a seven-fold rise over two decades. The corrosive combination of inflation and frozen tax thresholds means that hundreds of thousands more earners will be dragged into paying the 45p in the pound rate, and will have to grapple with a host of other tax hits that come with it. The additional rate of income tax is 45 per cent on income above £125,140. When introduced in 2010, it was set at 50 per cent on income above £150,000 and about 236,000 people paid it. But HM Revenue & Customs estimates that 1.2 million taxpayers will pay the additional rate this year, and its internal forecasts, seen by Money, show that the taxman expects 1.5 million people to be paying the 45p tax rate by 2028. By 2030 that figure will hit 1.7 million, according to analysis by the wealth manager Quilter, meaning an extra half a million people will be dragged above the threshold in the next five years. 'The number of people paying the additional rate of income tax has risen exponentially since thresholds were frozen,' said Shaun Moore from Quilter. The top rate of income tax was reduced to 45 per cent in 2013 under the coalition government. Kwasi Kwarteng tried to abolish it outright in his doomed mini-budget of 2022, but in 2023, the threshold was reduced to £125,140 by Jeremy Hunt to be in line with the point at which you lose all your tax-free allowance. This, combined with the freeze on income tax thresholds since 2021 and rising salaries, has dragged many more into the top tax band. By 2030 the proportion of total taxpayers paying the top rate will have jumped from 0.7 per cent to more than 4 per cent. Had the original £150,000 threshold risen with inflation since 2010 it would be £232,000 today. If the present £125,140 threshold had kept pace with inflation since 2023 it would be £132,000 today. 'When the additional rate was introduced, it was meant for the very highest earners. That's clearly no longer the case,' said Katherine Waller, the co-founder of the wealth manager Six Degrees. 'Since then, the threshold has been significantly reduced. The fact the rate itself has fallen is a minimal concession in that broader context. A far greater proportion of the workforce is now captured — far beyond what was originally intended.' • What is a 'comfortable' salary these days? Waller added that many families were still adjusting to a 'new normal' of higher costs and rates. She added: 'In theory, the additional rate should apply to those with significant earnings and the corresponding lifestyle. In that context, a salary of £125,000 doesn't stretch as far as it once did.' Polling by the think tank More In Common found that while overall life satisfaction was highest among those earning more than £100,000 a year — on average they gave their satisfaction 9.1 out of 10 — only 46 per cent said they felt 'very comfortable' financially. Another 46 per cent described themselves as 'relatively comfortable', while 7 per cent said they could cover essentials but had no room for luxuries. Adrian Anderson from the mortgage broker Anderson Harris said: 'The general feeling I get now from clients earning £125,140 a year is that they feel worse off in real terms than they were in 2015. People face higher taxes, higher interest rates and higher basic living expenses, so they have less disposable income.' He said that even very wealthy clients were now thinking twice about stretching their borrowing when it came to housing costs. He added: 'I used to see additional-rate taxpayers sending children to private school, but now it feels like both parents have to earn a six-figure salary to manage school fees and higher mortgage costs.' Once your income passes £125,140, you lose nearly half of any pay rise or bonus. That's because your marginal tax rate, what you pay on any extra £1 earned, is 47 per cent — 45 per cent income tax and 2 per cent national insurance. If you're also repaying a student loan, you typically pay another 9 per cent, bringing your total marginal rate to 56 per cent. At the same time, various forms of government support and tax reliefs disappear above certain income levels. They are mostly gone by the time you become an additional-rate taxpayer. Child benefit, worth £26.05 a week (£1,354.60 a year) for a first child and £17.25 a week (£897 a year) for other children, starts to be lost when one parent earns more than £60,000 a year. You lose it entirely once one parent earns £80,000. Tax-free childcare — where the government tops up £2 for every £8 spent on certain kinds of childcare, including nursery, childminders and after school clubs — is worth up to £2,000 per child a year. Entitlement is lost once one parent earns more than £100,000 a year. Families where one parent earns more than £100,000 also lose access to 15 or 30 hours of government-funded childcare during term time. Children aged nine months up to three years lose all their free childcare, and children aged three and four get only 15 hours instead of 30. • How much one year of Labour has cost you The average cost of a full-time (50 hours a week) nursery place for a child under two in England is £341.36 a week, according to the children's charity Coram. This means 30 hours of free childcare across 38 weeks of term time is worth £7,783 on average. Your personal allowance — the £12,570 chunk of income you can earn tax-free each year — starts to be cut once you earn more than £100,000 a year too. For every £2 earned above the threshold, you lose £1 of allowance. It's fully withdrawn by £125,140, when you begin paying the highest rate of tax. This gives workers earning between £100,000 and £125,140 a marginal income tax rate of 60 per cent. With 2 per cent national insurance and 9 per cent student loan repayments, the effective marginal rate could be 71 per cent, leaving you just 29p from every extra £1 earned. And that's before you factor in any lost childcare help. Additional-rate taxpayers also get no personal savings allowance, meaning they pay income tax on any interest from savings, unless the money is held in an Isa. Higher-rate payers can earn £500 a year in interest tax-free and basic-rate payers £1,000. The income you can earn each year from dividends before paying tax has also slashed from £2,000 in 2022-23 to £500. Additional-rate taxpayers pay 39.35 per cent on anything they make over this threshold (compared with 33.75 per cent for higher-rate taxpayers and 8.75 per cent for basic-rate taxpayers). A similar clampdown has happened on capital gains tax (CGT), which is charged on profits made from the sale of most assets. You used to be able to make up to £12,300 a year tax-free, but this was cut to £6,000 in April 2023 and halved again in April 2024. Higher and additional-rate taxpayers pay 24 per cent CGT on gains made above £3,000 a year, while basic-rate taxpayers pay 18 per cent. The final blow comes when earnings hit £200,000. At that point, workers begin to lose their £60,000 annual pension allowance, the maximum they can contribute to a pension each year while still receiving tax relief. The Treasury said: 'We are protecting payslips for working people by keeping our promise to not raise the basic, higher or additional rates of income tax, employee national insurance or VAT. That's the Plan for Change — protecting people's incomes and putting money into people's pockets.' • 'My reward for being a good saver? A £1,000 tax bill' Many high earners mitigate the tax burden by keeping their taxable income below key thresholds. This is usually done by saving more of your income into a pension, because all the thresholds above are based on your 'adjusted net income', which is your annual earnings (including bonuses) minus pension contributions and donations made to charities through Gift Aid. Jason Hollands from the wealth manager Evelyn Partners said additional-rate taxpayers often sacrificed bonuses or pay rises in exchange for increased employer pension contributions. 'Pension contributions are exempt from income tax and national insurance,' he said. 'This can help keep earnings below £125,140.' In many cases, it's worth going further. The most punitive cliff-edge comes at £100,000, where multiple benefits are lost and the personal allowance begins to reduce. As a result, some additional-rate taxpayers keep their income below this level through large pension contributions. 'It all depends on your living costs and personal circumstances,' said Chris Etherington from the accountancy firm RSM UK. 'If you're on £130,000 a year and have young children, it may make sense to cut your taxable income to below £100,000 to keep free childcare hours and your tax-free allowance. But it could make day-to-day cash flow tighter.' Calculations from RSM UK show that someone earning £130,000 would pay £44,703 in income tax. If that person paid enough into their pension to keep their income below the £100,000 threshold, they would pay £11,271 less in income tax. If they had a young family they could actually end up with more disposable income as a result because they would keep their childcare benefits. The 30 free childcare hours for two children under three would be worth £15,566 a year on average if they were in full-time, and tax-free childcare would be worth £4,000. Combined with the tax saved, that's £30,837, more than making up for the £30,000 saved into their pension, which has the potential to be boosted by tax relief and employer contributions. If income from savings, investments or property are pushing you over the £125,140 threshold and you are married or in a civil partnership, it could be worth transferring ownership of the assets to your partner if they are in a lower tax bracket. Transferring assets between spouses is tax-free, and so it could reduce the household's overall tax bill. Sean McCann from the wealth manager NFU Mutual said: 'One other area not to overlook is gifts made to charity via Gift Aid. These reduce your income and, in some circumstances, can help restore some or all the tax-free allowance and lower your tax bill.' Other tax-efficient investment options include venture capital trusts (VCTs) and enterprise investment schemes (EIS). These are government-backed schemes designed to encourage investment into small, early-stage companies. If you hold a VCT for five years and an EIS for three, you can claim 30 per cent income tax relief for each year. However, these are high-risk, niche products, so it's worth seeking financial advice before you make any moves. Hollands added: 'A six-figure salary has less wow factor than it did in the past, and a great many additional-rate taxpayers won't feel especially wealthy because the cost of living, higher mortgage costs and growing tax burden mean that the disposable income that can be used on the nice things in life won't be what it was in the past.' Suman Paul earns more than £126,000 a year, which should make him an additional-rate taxpayer. But Paul, an NHS consultant from Warrington in Cheshire, avoids the 45 per cent top rate of tax by making sure his income stays below the £100,000 cliff-edge. This means he keeps his tax-free personal allowance and still gets tax-free childcare for his daughter. 'Once you cross the £100,000 mark you start getting into marginal tax rates of 60 per cent, so that is one very inefficient tax trap that I want to avoid,' said Paul, 39. 'My daughter is also three and a half so we have to pay for nursery. We use the government's tax-free childcare scheme that gives you £2 for every £8 you spend. If we lose that, it would cost us more than £1,000 a year.' To manage his income, Paul pays for a car through his employer via salary sacrifice. It costs him £6,000 a year, which gets deducted from his salary pre-tax and reduces his taxable income. He also pays about £1,000 a month into his NHS pension and puts extra into his self-invested personal pension to bring his adjusted net income down further. Despite having an income that pushes him above the additional-rate threshold, Suman doesn't feel as if he lives a life of luxury. He said: 'It's a middle-class life. I can afford my mortgage, but my take-home pay does not feel like a lot. 'After paying all the fixed costs — mortgage, childcare, pension, car costs, bills — our disposable income is about £1,000 a month. And my wife is also a working professional. If I was a single earner, it would be much harder.'
Telegraph
2 hours ago
- Telegraph
Prison sentences are too lenient, public believes
Prison sentences are too lenient, according to the vast majority of the public. A poll also found that given a choice between expanding prison capacity or letting offenders out on shorter sentences, nearly nine in 10 (89 per cent) backed building more jails. A similar proportion – 86 per cent – believed that prison sentences have become shorter over the last decade despite an official government review arguing there had been a 'significant inflation' of jail terms in the past 20 years. The poll of 2,000 adults, by Merlin Strategy for the campaign group Crush Crime, highlights the disparity between the public's perception of sentencing as being too lenient while jail terms for serious offences have increased. According to the analysis, the public favoured emergency measures to expand prison capacity over Labour's plans to tackle the overcrowding crisis by allowing earlier releases for criminals who behave well and engage with rehabilitation programmes. This includes 77 per cent supporting the Government in forcing the courts to open for longer to get through the backlog and building emergency nightingale prisons to ramp up jail capacity. Lawrence Newport, the founder of Crush Crime, said: 'Over half of crime is committed by just ten per cent of offenders. These career criminals are regularly receiving minor prison sentences, or even no prison time at all. 'The public doesn't accept this, the public clearly wants crime to mean time. 'There is no justification for tiny sentences for violent offenders or career criminals with hundreds of offences to their name. Politicians must choose to act, to imprison career criminals and to crush crime.' 'No public mandate for shorter, softer sentences' Julian Gallie, the head of research at Merlin Strategy, said: 'There is clearly no public mandate for shorter, softer sentences. In all our examples of serious crimes, the public overwhelmingly say the sentences given were too soft. 'Only 14 per cent of the public say prison sentences have gotten shorter in the past decade, plans of reversing sentencing 'inflation' will not wash with a public who already think sentences are too soft.' The researchers tested the public's views on a number of convicted criminals' actual sentences to determine if they felt they were too lenient or too tough. Three-quarters (74 per cent) said the sentence given to Rakeem Miles was too soft. Miles punched a man in the head for brushing past him on the escalator. The man passed away two days later in hospital. In court, Miles showed no remorse and was sentenced to five and a half years in jail. A larger proportion (81 per cent) said the sentence given to Jonathan Hunt was also too lenient. Hunt beat his girlfriend so badly the court described it as a 'horror movie'. He had 13 previous convictions for 28 offences, including for domestic violence. He was sentenced to two years and 11 months in jail. The highest proportion (83 per cent) said the sentence given to Michael Delaney was too lenient. Delaney injured two men in unprovoked assaults in a library. He had 68 convictions for 273 offences. He was sentenced to 36 weeks in prison, but as he had been held on remand since December, he was released immediately.
