16 Dec 2022
What’s the problem?
Right now, millions of households are struggling to heat their homes and pay their energy bills due to soaring gas prices, the increasing cost of living and the high rates of energy inefficiency in UK homes.
Since 2021, the average household energy bill has almost doubled. This has left many people forced to ration their energy usage, living in cold, damp homes, and even struggling to put food on the table, as energy bills remain unaffordable.
Although rising energy prices affect us all, some of us are impacted worse than others, with fuel poverty disproportionately affecting certain communities such as people of colour, disabled people, those on low incomes and private renters.
To tackle these problems, we need huge improvements to the energy efficiency of our homes and reforms to fix our broken energy system. However, these’ll take time and, in the short term, urgent additional support is needed to ensure people can live in warm homes that don’t cost the Earth.
What are we calling for?
- Greater targeted support for those who are still in fuel poverty. In July 2023 the government withdrew its energy bill support scheme, despite bills remaining at almost double pre-COVID levels. We want to see the government introduce urgent, targeted support for the almost 6 million households that remain in fuel poverty.
- The government to consider options such as a social tariff for April 2024 onwards in its review of consumer protections. Those on low incomes should be charged less for their energy, whereas higher-income, high-energy users should be charged more to incentivise energy savings.
By offering this emergency support and making energy more affordable to those on low incomes, we can ensure that everyone lives in a warm, comfortable home, while we continue to tackle the challenges of energy inefficiency and reforming our broken energy system for good.
