United Kingdom: Millions of households condemned to cold or debt with the new minimum prices
Screengrab from Meet White Dee, Season 1 / Episode 1 of Benefits Street. (Channel 4 / YouTube)
The 80% increase in the cap on electricity and natural gas bills in the UK, decided by the Ofgen authority and which will come into effect in the autumn, will lead millions of families to energy poverty, while the crisis worsens cost of living fuels recession fears.
Today British citizens are talking about the increase in the maximum ceiling for energy bills by the regulator Ofgem, which starting from 1 October will reach the record figure of 3,549 pounds (4200 euros approximately), starting from the current 1,971 pounds (2.2340 euros). The cap is expected to rise to 5,439 pounds (approximately 6,430 euros) by January and 7,272 pounds (approximately 8,600 euros) by the spring, due to the soaring wholesale prices of natural gas and electricity, caused by the decline in Russian energy supplies to Europe, exacerbated by Western sanctions that have turned against us.
"An increase of this magnitude cannot be put on the shoulders of families who have no room for maneuver," said Peter Smith, director of policy and advocacy at National Energy Action. " In October, low-income families simply won't turn on the heat ."
Reuters spoke to an Englishman, Philip Keetley, who said:
" The cost of living has risen, yet we are expected to still live on the expected money when there was no crisis … I can have the heating on or eat ".
Another Briton, Dawn White, who suffers from kidney failure, fears that soaring energy costs won't allow her to afford life-saving medical treatment:
"Without my (dialysis) machine five times a week, for 20 hours, I will die," said the 59-year-old.
The surge in energy inflation has crushed British real earnings, forcing many to cut back on spending, but the energy shock will lead to an even worse situation, throwing more fuel on the inflationary flames.
The last time the inflation rate exceeded 18% was during the stagflation years of the mid-1970s (more precisely in 1976), when an oil shock led to a surge in energy prices in Worldwide. It is currently at 10.1 /, but with these increases there is a good chance it will be surpassed.
Inflation to its highest in decades has pushed the UK's Misery Index, an economic indicator that measures the situation of the average person, to its highest in three decades, a sign that discontent is emerging.
Last winter the cap was £ 1,277, but that was before European leaders sanctioned Moscow for invading Ukraine. A few months into the cold season, electricity prices are already at record highs due to disruptions in Russian natural gas Nord Stream 1 to the blockade.
This winter could be one of the darkest in decades for British families. The government has allocated billions of pounds to support families, but this may not reduce the growing discontent. The protest is growing: more than 116,000 enraged people have pledged not to pay their electricity bills this autumn, when the new price limit begins, in a movement called 'Don't Pay UK'.
" Ofgem has just issued a debt and death sentence for millions of people: we have no choice but to refuse to pay ," said the anonymous group leading the effort to ensure that more than one million British boycott the payment of the electricity bill by 1 October. All in an environment where millions of families are already in debt with heavy real estate loans. What will happen starting in October is in the Hands of God.
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The article United Kingdom: with the new minimum prices, millions of families condemned to cold or to debt comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/regno-unito-con-i-nuovi-prezzi-minimi-milioni-di-famiglie-condannate-al-freddo-o-ai-debiti/ on Sat, 27 Aug 2022 16:30:55 +0000.