Scottish Power announces huge price hikes

chewmylegoff

Graham_Devon wrote: »

It does. Though you do have to wait for 36 hours before it arrives here.

whilst i sometimes wish that i was over 24,000,000,000 miles from scotland, unfortunately this isn't the case!!

Thrugelmir

kabayiri wrote: »

A large chunk of our energy suppliers are now in foreign hands. Why should they care what the UK consumer pays long term?

A fair chunk of the shareholding sits in UK hands. Some people have invested in utility companies (as boring as investments as they are) for many years.

Kohoutek

kabayiri wrote: »

Does this increase further undermine the argument that privatisation in utility companies is of benefit to the consumer?

A large chunk of our energy suppliers are now in foreign hands. Why should they care what the UK consumer pays long term?

Obviously you're right that private utility companies want to protect their margins, but they don't set wholesale energy prices.

I think the bigger problem is that energy policy in the UK has been mismanaged by every government for a very long time. We're very dependent on natural gas in the UK for electricity generation and heating despite the fact that our natural gas production is in terminal decline.

It's this lack of a coherent energy policy that's put UK consumer particularly exposed to price variations in the natural gas markets. As natural gas is used to replace coal for environmental reasons in electricity generation and potential oil for transport for scarcity reasons, the price can only really go one way.

1984ReturnsForReal_2

Scottish Power announce free money. For themselves.

michaels

Strange thing is in the US they have suddenly found they have more gas than they can use and prices have fallen off a cliff - at one point it looked like we would in turn benefit from cheap lng that could not find a market there but the Japan crisis and nuclear backlash looks like it has put paid to that.

I can't understand why privatisation is being mentioned - if it hadn't happened the supply companies would be much less efficient so prices would be higher unless the utilities were being run at a loss and so taxes would be higher instead.

Don't forget, the pain of high energy prices is a very strong signal to conserve energy and be as efficient as possible which is just what the doctor ordered in terms of the environment. If high prices encourage people to make sure homes are draught proofed and wear more clothes rather than turning the heating up is that a bad thing?

STing

michaels wrote: »

If high prices encourage people to make sure homes are draught proofed and wear more clothes rather than turning the heating up is that a bad thing?

You're saying high energy prices now are good as they conserve fuel. This allows energy prices to be not so high in the future?

It's mad, and makes perfect sense.

A._Badger

michaels wrote: »

Don't forget, the pain of high energy prices is a very strong signal to conserve energy and be as efficient as possible which is just what the doctor ordered in terms of the environment. If high prices encourage people to make sure homes are draught proofed and wear more clothes rather than turning the heating up is that a bad thing?

Yes, it's a bad thing. How many old people do you want to sacrifice through hypothermia before your 'Green' gods are assuaged?

The_White_Horse

This will not affect inflation because the BOE simply dismisses everything that causes inflation and then says "there is no inflation". It's genius.

I may use it at work

"why have you not completed all this work?"
"well, actually, if you don't take into account all the work i haven't done, all the tasks are completed"
"oh yes, you are correct. well done"

chucky

shortchanged wrote: »

The figures announced by Scottish Power (10% for electricity and 19%:eek: for gas) are far bigger than most people anticipated.

hasn't anyone heard of uSwitch or is every single person in the UK using Scottish power and aren't able to change fuel provider?

DervProf

chucky wrote: »

hasn't anyone heard of uSwitch or is every single person in the UK using Scottish power and aren't able to change fuel provider?

Great idea, switch to another provider who will no doubt follow Scottish Power's lead in the next few weeks/months.