Energy Price Guarantee No Longer 2 years just 6 months at current level

wittynamegoeshere

I wonder what percentage they manage to recover after squirting the gas into underground rocks?  Surely not all of it, plus the energy involved in shoving it down there must be substantial.

I'm thinking that the brains in Centrica must think it's going to be much more expensive later, so they'll profit from doing this despite whatever losses.  I doubt they're doing it just because they care about us all.

deano2099

ariarnia said:

what we've been talking about is assessment of need for heating help next winter and me saying it should based on need at the time of help being given and you (and others) saying people should be expected to improve there situation before they can get help. such as people with large homes shouldn't get help because they should sell them and move. thats not about political parties but about individual principles and ethics. i want to help people who are in need now and prioritise the limited resources based on that need until we are out of this immediate crisis. you want people to jump through hoops and prove they deserve it. 

if we're talking generality yes there will always be gaps and people who are just short of getting help. and its not about the evil conservatives or irrisponsable labour because both parties have done it the same way when in power. but if you spend a minute to think about how the government (all of them) assess things like winter fuel allowance and other benifits then they dont consider assets like houses and dont expect people to sell there house or move to qualify so its much more likely that it'll be done my way and not the way you seem to want it to happen.

You're conflating what I want to happen with what I'm saying will happen given the circumstances and political climate. If you want to know what I *want* to happen you can find the thread where I propose what's basically a Universal Basic Income-style intervention (3k grant to everyone, recouped by significant rises in income taxes).
That's no more likely to happen than assessment based on house size though. As you say, the government don't consider houses, so people in expensive to heat 5-bedroom houses are unlikely to get more than people in efficient 2-bedroom houses.
Where you're right is that they're likely to keep it as "per property" rather than "per person", which means a single person living in a large house will get as much as a family living in a large house. Personally I don't think that's fair but you're correct that they're unlikely to do it that way. It's not impossible though.

Honestly the most equitable way of doing it that might actually happen is a two pronged system: an energy grant per person, then a heating grant for the house based on EPC rating and council tax band (to approximate size).

You're right that regardless of election result, that won't change much. I think things would be very different now if we had a Corbyn government, and I don't think that's something contentious - I mean, putting aside the argument of whether it would be better or worse, I think we can all agree it would be very *different*. But political doesn't mean "party political" - if you care about people getting what they need to live, if you care about equality, if you care about any of that stuff, then you're interested in politics. It's not just about who you vote for.