October 22 price cap announcement

Mstty

Shedman said:

Let's hope for a very mild winter.....

Yes just this otherwise it will be doubly as painful.

Any long term weather forecasts out yet?

jimexbox

Where the *'***** is our government to at least respond in some coherent way? To busy navel gazing. 

I'm disgusted by their' it will be alright on the night' attitude. It's a dereliction of duty. 

MattMattMattUK

wrf12345 said:

That is a huge increase in electric, it does not reflect the average wholesale electric price over the last year which is less than half but does reflect the price over the last month or so. The govn has thrown enough money at the sector, now it is down to reduction in use by consumers rather than lining the pockets of the energy companies. 

It is not meant to reflect the cost over the last year, but over the reference period, which it does. 

wrf12345 said:

The high users have a much easier time than the low users to reduce bills

That always depends on why they are a high user. If they are someone with a heated swimming pool who runs air-con in summer and keeps their house at 25c all winter then it is very easy to cut down. If they are a family of four with young children in a draughty rented home then it is very difficult to cut down. Things are not always as simple as you like to believe. 

wrf12345 said:

a return of "free" solar with smart meters that run backwards so the consumer has the full credit is about the only option - rolled out to suitable roofs by household income. But to do that on scale we need a couple of mega factories in the UK churning out the latest spec solar panels, inverters etc.

There is no such thing as "free", it has to be paid for by someone and "the govern" is not that someone, the government gets it's revenue from taxpayers, not from thin air. Also running meters backwards is an awful idea, it goes no way to understanding the actual costs of delivering energy to the user. The term "mega factory" is just a gimmick, the reality is that it would take 2-5 years to get solar production scaled in the UK with significant investment and if the government were going to throw tens of billions at energy then wind turbines and nuclear are far better options. I suspect going from your previous posts the reason you like the idea of "free" solar is you see someone else paying for it, then you getting to reap the benefits.

wrf12345

weather has a 13 year cycle, can't quite recall when we had that siberian winter - 2010?

BUFF

wrf12345 said:

"If they ban standing charges, then who would cover the costs of maintaining the network? "
It will come out of the unit charge, which may or may not need to increase, depending on how you treat the energy companies, reducing their profit from 3 percent to 0.3 percent would probably pay for it - they keep telling us it is an emergency situation.
Reducing council tax always gives people the option to change properties to get the rebate and would possibly encourage older people into smaller houses. Councils are laughably inefficient and would have to absorb the lack of income. It is not quite as bad as it sounds as most of their money still comes from central govn.

whether you use 1 unit or 1000 units the fixed costs of the network are averaged to be the same (otherwise rural users would pay much more than city users). If you take the costs of the network out of the standing charge then some people will overpay & some will underpay. iirc Utilita may still offer a no standing charge tariff but the cost of your first units per day are much, much higher.
iirc the limit for profit for retail energy supply to the public is 2% not 3% but many companies are making much less.

I sit on a Community Council here in Glasgow, Yes, the city council is inefficient but part of that is because it is also under-funded/understaffed (the Scottish govt over the last ~10 years has , in real terms, taken a lot of money away from the large cities). .

wrf12345

"A proper list showing the various regions here. https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/sites/default/files/2022-08/Default%20tariff%20cap%20level%20-%201%20October%202022%20-%2031%20December%202022.pdf!

What a load of gibberish, the first thing the "new" govn can do is mandate a single rate for gas and electricity for the whole of England and if Ofgem put the info out in units that don't relate to the meter then a ten percent pay cut.

Mstty

Martin Lewis doing a decent job explaining the price cap is not a ceiling on GMTV.

Fairzo

wrf12345 said:

weather has a 13 year cycle, can't quite recall when we had that siberian winter - 2010?

I can recall a big freeze in December 2010. Temps down to -10°, railway lines frozen etc.

MattMattMattUK

wrf12345 said:

The govn should ban energy standing charges

I know you keep banging this drum, but it makes no sense. Standing charges reflect the cost of maintaining the energy networks, it makes sense that everyone who uses the network pays for that. It seems your reason you want them banned is because it will financially benefit you, that is not a valid reason.

wrf12345 said:

reduce council tax by £1000 for bands A-D

Why? Do those people not use local services? Let me guess, you own a property in bands A-D and would like someone else to pay?

wrf12345 said:

and get rid of the tv licence

Again, why? How would you pay for the BBC?

wrf12345 said:

rather than throw further money at the energy companies who have twenty years of ripping people off against six months of losing money.

The energy providers have not be "ripping people off", the maximum profit they have been allowed to make on capped SVRs is 2%, on fixed rates they historically made around 3-3.5%. They lost more money in the last year than they made in the previous five.

wrf12345 said:

They could also have a capped rate at half the current rates for the first £20 of gas and electric monthly useage.

They could have given everyone a free pig, just because they can do something, does not mean that they should.

wrf12345 said:

"If they ban standing charges, then who would cover the costs of maintaining the network? "
It will come out of the unit charge, which may or may not need to increase, depending on how you treat the energy companies,

The unit rate would need to increase, which means that low users are being subsidised by average and higher users. I know you want to be subsidised, but that is not a rational way to base government policy.

wrf12345 said:

reducing their profit from 3 percent to 0.3 percent would probably pay for it - they keep telling us it is an emergency situation.

Great idea, most of them would exit the market, inward investment to the UK would start to dry up if companies think there is a risk of only being allowed to make 0.3%. Maybe we should cut your income by 90% because other people would like to be subsidised?

wrf12345 said:

Reducing council tax always gives people the option to change properties to get the rebate and would possibly encourage older people into smaller houses.

There are two major reasons why older people do not downsize, firstly because they like their homes and want to live in them, secondly because SDLT punishes them to do so, to downsize they have to hand the government a chunk of money, rather than lowering Council Tax abolishing SDLT would make far more sense, it would make the housing market much more mobile, SDLT is a bad tax on pretty much every measure.

wrf12345 said:

Councils are laughably inefficient and would have to absorb the lack of income. It is not quite as bad as it sounds as most of their money still comes from central govn.

Councils are already on the very of failing in most of the country, they can barely afford their statutory obligations such as social services, hence the awful state of council (rather than Highways Agency) maintained roads. Council Tax still represents a significant portion of their income. 

MattMattMattUK

wrf12345 said:

weather has a 13 year cycle, can't quite recall when we had that siberian winter - 2010?

No, weather does not have a thirteen year cycle.