Problems for Labour as people are already protesting the energy price cap rise

Fuel poverty and climate groups protested outside energy giant SSE’s offices in Glasgow as households face rising energy bills due to the 6.4% increase in the energy price cap – allegedly due to wholesale gas prices.

Energy price cap: another rip off for us, but a win for SSE

Fuel Poverty Action, Extinction Rebellion Glasgow, Friends of the Earth Scotland, and Unite Community branches protested outside the company’s city centre building:

Energy regulator Ofgem today announced a rise of £111 in average household energy bills, which it made clear was due to “our reliance on international gas markets leads to volatile wholesale prices, and continues to drive up bills”:

In 2023 an estimated 34% (around 861,000 households) of all households in Scotland were in fuel poverty, with 491,000 households in extreme fuel poverty.

SSE have made £8 billion in profits since the start of the energy price crisis. The company operates 14 fossil fuel power plants in the UK and Ireland and generates the majority of its energy from burning gas:

Dylan McAllister, a member of Fuel Poverty Action Glasgow, said of the energy price cap rise:

Millions of people have suffered this winter in cold damp homes – and coming into spring the future doesn’t look much brighter, with Ofgem set to wave through yet another bill increase. Ofgem have signed off on profits for shareholders and huge pay packets for energy bosses – but when it comes to protecting us from being ripped off they’re nowhere to be seen. They’ve failed to scrap cruel standing charges despite the clear verdict of their own consultation, and failed to tackle hugely inflated electricity prices, four times more expensive than gas.

With Ofgem under government review, it’s time to make regulation work for ordinary people, not the interests of private energy firms. Nearly 70,000 people have signed a new petition calling for just that.

Climate campaigners are also warning that SSE’s proposals to build a new power station at Peterhead that burns gas to generate electricity would lock people in Scotland for years into higher bills driven by the international price of gas.

Despite these concerns, the Scottish Government is considering approving the controversial project which could operate until 2059, well past the 2045 ‘net zero’ target for Scotland. Adding carbon capture to power plants could further increase the cost of electricity with the additional levies added to bills to pay for the £22 billion handout to the technology by the UK government:

These companies have exploited us for too long

Friends of the Earth Scotland’s oil and gas campaigner Freya Aitchison said of the energy price cap rise:

Burning expensive gas to generate electricity will leave us all more vulnerable to international price shocks like we have suffered in recent years. The sure-fire way to bring down bills is a mass programme of home energy efficiency and powering our lives using affordable renewable energy that is run in the public interest.

Families across Scotland will rightly be worried about another increase in energy bills due to the global price of gas, so it is mind blowing that Scottish Government Ministers are considering locking people further into this exploitative system. The only beneficiaries from a new gas burning power station at Peterhead will be greedy energy companies like SSE who have been lobbying hard for its approval.

In fact, costly technology like the carbon capture proposed at Peterhead will be subsidised through additional levies on household energy bills, and its consistent failures around the world show it is wasting precious time and money.

Even if new gas wasn’t such an awful deal for consumers, this project should not go ahead because of the enormous climate pollution it will inevitably bring. Building new fossil fuel infrastructure will take us in entirely the wrong direction, undermines a just transition and keeps power in the hands of companies who have been allowed to exploit us for too long.

Featured image and additional images via Garry F McHarg/Focal Scotland.