Energy bills latest: the Westminster penalty

Fresh IEA/DESNZ data confirms the UK has the highest industrial electricity prices in the world. Just as striking, it shows we are middle of the pack for gas prices.

That finding blows apart the story pushed in Westminster by the likes of Ed Miliband – that high bills are simply a “fossil fuel penalty”. The evidence shows otherwise. Gas isn’t the problem. It’s the costs piled on electricity bills by policy.

DESNZ tries disguise all of this by lumping policy costs under the heading of wholesale prices. What DESNZ calls the wholesale price includes:

• Subsidies like ROs, FiTs and CfDs loaded into the market price.

• Balancing and constraint payments when intermittent wind and solar can’t deliver.

• Billions in new transmission lines and grid upgrades.

• Payments to keep backup fossil plants on standby.

Each new wave of renewables increases those hidden costs. Miliband’s AR7 and AR8 will lock in even more – pushing electricity prices further above our competitors and driving industry out of Britain. We call this the Westminster penalty. 

The IEA has it in black and white: Britain’s high energy bills are made in Westminster.