Energy company treatment of customers 'obscene' - MS

In May, energy regulator Ofgem said the typical household should expect to see an £800 increase to their bill, up to £2,800, following a £600 increase in April.

This would mean the average bill would have doubled since October 2021, when the typical bill was £1,400.

Energy industry analysts are now warning that the average bill could now top £3,300 in October, rising again to £3,615 a year from January 2023.

In response, Carolyn Thomas has hit out at energy companies for making ‘obscene’ profits at the expense of consumers. Carolyn said: “the sorts of increases we are talking about here are simply unsustainable for many households across North Wales – as winter approaches, it is clear that further intervention is required from the government.”

Carolyn continued: “We’ve seen just last week, Centrica, the owners of British Gas, announcing a 500% increase in quarterly profits – a staggering £1.34bn of profit. Shell also announced record quarterly profits of £9.5bn.”

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“Private ownership means that these companies are able to make such staggering profits whilst putting consumers energy bills up by nearly 200 per cent in a year. It is obscene.”

Carolyn argued that the best way to reduce bills was to bring energy companies into public ownership and that the government should intervene and nationalise private energy providers.

She added: “Under public ownership, instead of stuffing the pockets of a small number of shareholders with billions of pounds of profit, those huge sums of money would be used to significantly reduce the bills of consumers.”

“People are already having to make tough choices between using appliances or buying food and this is only going to get worse as we head into the winter.

“A failure to act will be consigning many people across the country to an incredibly bleak winter which some vulnerable people might not make it through.”