Public Expenditure Minister Paschal Donohoe has indicated that he "expects" some one-off measures introduced last year "may be needed again" to help with the rising cost of living.
However, the Fine Gael TD warned that we are still too far from October’s Budget to commit to any measures.
This is despite a number of Budget kites being flown four-and-a-half months out from the big day.
READ MORE: Experts sound alarm as Ireland risks 'repeating mistakes of Celtic Tiger'
Budget 2023 included a cost-of-living package worth over €4 billion to deal with the rising cost of living. It included, among other measures, three €200 electricity credits.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Today with Claire Byrne this morning, Mr Donohoe indicated that some one-off measures may be needed again this year.
He said: "I expect that there will be some measures that we've had in the past that may be needed again.
"But I really can't give an indication as to what the breadth of them will be or what the measures could be.
"The reason why I say that is if you look at where we are with inflation overall, last year was around eight per cent. For this year, we believe that it will come just below five per cent.
"We're hoping for next year we'll be around 2.5 per cent. We are seeing some signs that inflation is coming down.
"But for any of your listeners, when they go into a shop or where they go in to pay a bill, even though prices are not going up at the speed they did last year, they’re still going up."
Minister Donohoe acknowledged that while wholesale electricity prices have fallen, it has yet to be passed through to customers. He noted that when prices initially rose, there was a time lag before increases appeared on bills and a similar gap will exist now prices have decreased.
He added: "It must happen. I believe it will happen. That is one of the reasons why I can't answer the question regarding one-off measures because we'll need to see clearly where we are in September and early October."
A report published by the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (IFAC) on Tuesday warned that the Government is risking "repeating the mistakes" of the Celtic Tiger that saw the country plummet into a deep recession in the mid-2000s.
It advised that the Government should stick to spending rules that limit the overall increase in public spending to five per cent.
They warned that huge surpluses should not tempt the Government to spend or cut taxes excessively.
Minister Donohoe said there is a need to "look at the bigger picture" and Ireland has forecast several years of Budget surpluses as it has not spent corporation tax increases.
Following a controversial opinion piece from Fine Gael Junior Ministers Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, Martin Heydon and Peter Burke calling for €1,000 tax cuts for middle-income earners, the Dublin Central TD said that it was appropriate to help middle Ireland.
Mr Donohoe said: "If you look at the principle of what they're arguing about, and all I'm going to deal with is the principle because the figures are a matter for Budget Day, I do think it's appropriate to look at how we can help with the rising cost of living.
"We have done that in all of our recent Budgets. We are not going to do anything, because we haven't done it before, that would put our public finances at risk."
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