Soaring Energy Bills Are Sign Of Failure To Exploit UK Supplies

Having just emerged from the Covid pandemic, Britain appears to be hurtling towards another national crisis. If the dire predictions about soaring energy bills are proved correct, then the public will experience a bigger shock to living standards than anything endured in modern times.

- Leo McKinstry

Unless the Government acts resolutely, households could be left destitute in the face of unaffordable demands. Only yesterday, the money-saving expert Martin Lewis warned that “a tragedy is about to unfold” in the form of “a financial cataclysm”.

This was no wild exaggeration, given the brutal scale of the forecast price increases. The typical bill for a household on a capped dual-fuel tariff is expected to rise to a colossal £3,500 in the autumn, reaching £4,400 in April. Such exorbitant hikes are far beyond the means of people on average incomes and will spell poverty on an epic scale.

Indeed, many consumers are already struggling due to energy inflation, with one quarter of households currently behind on their payments. Meanwhile, the Don’t Pay movement, which urges mass civil disobedience in response to the looming emergency, claims more than 97,000 people are now prepared to cancel their direct debits.