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Bosses of the UK’s largest energy firms have called on the government to intervene with “unprecedented” measures to prevent a fuel poverty crisis next winter.
The chief executives told MPs investigating energy prices that while pre-payment customers were already reeling from the effects of rising bills, they expected the numbers in financial distress to only increase as time goes on ahead of another expected leap in the energy price cap from October.
The cap rose by a record £693 per year on average in April – with pre-payment customers, who tend to be among the most vulnerable, facing an even larger increase.
The Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) committee heard ScottishPower chief executive Keith Anderson call for the cap system – blamed for the failure of dozens of competitors as they were unable to pass on huge rises in raw energy costs – to be scrapped in favour of a social tariff that would see the better off pay more.
He also suggested that, in the interim, a deficit fund should be established to allow people deemed struggling to be given 10 years to pay off £1,000 on their bills.
Mr Anderson described the situation facing families as “horrific” and said of his plan: “I think the problem’s got to a size and scale where it requires something significant of that nature where, for those people who are deemed to be in poverty…, that puts their bill back to where it used to be before the gas crisis”, he explained.
His counterpart at E.ON, Mike Lewis, raised fears that up to 40% of households faced fuel poverty from October when energy use typically rises and the price cap is due to be adjusted again.
He supported the social tariff idea but said the government needed to do more than the Council…
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Source : skynews
