UK electricity and gas bills have soared this spring after energy regulator Ofgem revised its energy price cap, increasing it dramatically by 54% from £1,277 to as much as £1,971. In 2019, 3.16 million households were officially in fuel poverty in the UK, according to Office for National Statistics data. The estimated total number of households now predicted to be in fuel poverty due to the latest price cap rise from 1 April 2022 is 6.32 million.
In a 2015 report by the Association for the Conservation of Energy, the UK ranked last out of 16 European countries for the proportion of households that are unable to afford to adequately heat their homes, and it ranked 14th on fuel poverty, with only Slovenia and Ireland having a higher proportion of people struggling to pay their energy bills. According to ACE spokeswoman Jenny Holland: “Of the 26 million households in the UK, four out of five have poor levels of energy efficiency, rated band D or below.”
This Public Policy Exchange special symposium will provide an opportunity for local authorities, fuel poverty campaigners, the NHS, the social care sector, local community groups, voluntary organisations, energy regulators and energy industry representatives and other key stakeholders to discuss the escalating energy crisis and ideas for how to tackle spiralling fuel poverty in the UK now and for the longer-term.