Are energy prices fair

Fire_Fox

mattcanary wrote: »

Everyone should be able to heat their home sufficiently within a modern, so called civilised country. Many people that have problems in doing this are elderly, often frail people that are someone's parent or grandparent. Many die each winter because they cannot afford to keep their house warm. In a supposedly civilised country!

How many pensioners die each winter from hypothermia? And of those how many die without any assets, i.e. they genuinely can't afford more heating?

mattcanary

Enlighten me - Fire Fox. What are the stats?

Ken68

Millions of non internet savvy OAP's are paying full wack, although the WFA does help.

http://news.patient.co.uk/newspaper.asp?ss=10&pc=9135

Premier_2

mattcanary wrote: »

Everyone should be able to heat their home sufficiently within a modern, so called civilised country. Many people that have problems in doing this are elderly, often frail people that are someone's parent or grandparent. Many die each winter because they cannot afford to keep their house warm. In a supposedly civilised country!

If higher-earning people have to be taxed a little (a LITTLE) bit higher so this can be achieved, it should be done. Richer people can afford it.

This government spends £2.7bn per year giving out winter fuel benefits granting people in need up to £400 per year extra to cope with with winter fuel bills.

Perhaps if those in need actually spent that money on what it was intended for, rather than buying their grandchilden christmas presents with it, they wouldn't die.

Haarlem

Premier wrote: »

This government spends £2.7bn per year giving out winter fuel benefits granting people in need up to £400 per year extra to cope with with winter fuel bills.

Plus the levy we all pay (averaging £76pa) to enable Social Tariffs to be offered to selected customers.

KimYeovil

mattcanary wrote: »

Enlighten me - Fire Fox. What are the stats?

About 0.0%.

Ken68

Once the money is in someones wallet or bank account, how do you know how they spend it. ? And if you give vouchers or whatever, the energy providers will just fiddle it away.
I for one like the present system, up to me if I spend it on whisky, and that would be my problem anyway, nowt to do with you.

Cardew

There are no reliable statistics on people 'dying of cold'.

Those who make the emotive remarks, as above - about people dying each winter beacause they cannot afford to keep their houses warm - usually quote the 'excess winter death' figures.

Unquestionably more people die during the winter. This link gives some facts:

http://www.ageconcern.org.uk/AgeConcern/ftf_winter_deaths.asp

However to deduce that people cannot afford to heat, and hence die, is a nonsense.

aelitaman

Personally I think they have the pricing the wrong way round. Currently you pay a lot upfront to have gas then when this standaing charge or primary units have been consumed you get cheap gas. My last gas tariff was 2.05p per Kwh so after paying the primary the bill is never going to be expensive for "over using" gas. If I decided to use another 10000Kwh per gas by haveing a sauna or a hot tub then this would cost 205 piunds or 17 pounds a month averaged over a year. In terms of people earning 80K plus per year this is one meal in a fancy restaurent, no deterent against using gas at all.

So in my view the tariffs should be the other way around. The govt or ofgem should decide what an average gas consumption per year would be for a couple 2 kids (replacements for the parents) in an average decently insulated house.

The tariffs should start low so that single people that are frugal or old age pensioners that have to heat one or two rooms constantly in winter are not penalised by charges.

Then the tariffs should increase to a reasonable figure at cthe average consumption decided above and for gas I think this should be about 400 to 500 pounds per year total charge for this average consumption.

Then the tariffs should sky rocket so that people that have 6 kids or mansions or are really profligate with energy pay massive ammounts for this over consumption. A 16 room mansion in london with a rich couple in it that can afford 15K a year private school fees should be paying 10K a year for gas comsption of arround 30000 plus Kwh per year.

The same should be done with electricity. This is the only way that people will stop being profligate with energy. Reward them for being repsonsible instead of penalising the frugal and not charging the profligate enough.

Is it going to happen no chance why? Because once the energy companies have covered thier costs they want you to use more and more because it is basically all profit (just the cost of the gas used) hence we have high initial useage charges and then low cost per Kwh.

Cardew

aelitaman wrote: »

Personally I think they have the pricing the wrong way round. Currently you pay a lot upfront to have gas then when this standaing charge or primary units have been consumed you get cheap gas. My last gas tariff was 2.05p per Kwh so after paying the primary the bill is never going to be expensive for "over using" gas. If I decided to use another 10000Kwh per gas by haveing a sauna or a hot tub then this would cost 205 piunds or 17 pounds a month averaged over a year. In terms of people earning 80K plus per year this is one meal in a fancy restaurent, no deterent against using gas at all.

So in my view the tariffs should be the other way around. The govt or ofgem should decide what an average gas consumption per year would be for a couple 2 kids (replacements for the parents) in an average decently insulated house.

The tariffs should start low so that single people that are frugal or old age pensioners that have to heat one or two rooms constantly in winter are not penalised by charges.

Then the tariffs should increase to a reasonable figure at cthe average consumption decided above and for gas I think this should be about 400 to 500 pounds per year total charge for this average consumption.

Then the tariffs should sky rocket so that people that have 6 kids or mansions or are really profligate with energy pay massive ammounts for this over consumption. A 16 room mansion in london with a rich couple in it that can afford 15K a year private school fees should be paying 10K a year for gas comsption of arround 30000 plus Kwh per year.

The same should be done with electricity. This is the only way that people will stop being profligate with energy. Reward them for being repsonsible instead of penalising the frugal and not charging the profligate enough.

Is it going to happen no chance why? Because once the energy companies have covered thier costs they want you to use more and more because it is basically all profit (just the cost of the gas used) hence we have high initial useage charges and then low cost per Kwh.

Actually in the much maligned energy profligate USA they have such a system in some States.

In a property I own, I pay at a lower rate for the first 1,000kWh per month and then an extra 10% for any consumption over that.

For every multi-millionaire living in a 15 room mansion in London, I suggest there are many widows/widowers living in old large houses that cost a lot to heat.

Besides it wouldn't take too much ingenuity for large houses to have separate supplies to ' The West Wing', The East Wing' the Servants quarters etc;)