MSE News: Energy secretary backs ask for those on fixed tariffs to benefit from '£150 off bills'

MSE_Abby

The energy secretary, Ed Miliband, has penned a letter to major suppliers calling on them to pass the Budget's '£150 off bills' on to those on fixed tariffs. The letter follows MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis' asks on the issue, after he told the energy secretary he would "push very hard" on it...

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'Energy secretary backs Martin Lewis’ call for those on fixed tariffs to benefit from '£150 off bills' from April'

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SKD99

Hi Martin, I suspect this is only referring to gas and electricity?  Is it £150 off each, or £150 total reduction per household? What about those of us dependent on oil for heating, instead of gas?  Is this budget intervention applicable, or should I expect/hope for just £75 off my annual electricity bill from April?  

Sorry for all the questions?  Thanks for all that you do for all consumers.

Simon

Qyburn

SKD99 said:

... What about those of us dependent on oil for heating, instead of gas?  Is this budget intervention applicable, or should I expect/hope for just £75 off my annual electricity bill from April?  

None of the measures mentioned will affect the price of heating oil. Although to add context as far as I'm aware these various policy charges have never been applied to oil anyway.

However you need to accept that headline grabbers like ML, or politicians for that matter, seem to assume every household has gas available.

MattMattMattUK

For a typical user just over seventy percent of the savings are on electricity, due to not being typical your mileage may vary.

seanie_sean

Any reduction is appreciated but its hardly a cut, as the cap has gone up £190 since Labour came to power so its all a con. And in the meantime energy companies making huge profits, i am a very low user and i am unable ti save on my bills as standing charge is double my monthly spend on electric 

Scot_39

There is no real saving - costs are merely being shifted from bills to general taxation.

The £150, at some average used by govt - not the standard Ofgem cap tdcv, is though weighted towards electric.

But given govt imposed costs - policy costs alone up £79 / 50% to £235 by Jan in under 2 years  - with network and wholesale costs higher due to net zero policy too - it is a bit rich to paint it as a genuine saving.

Now if the levys and eco schemes were being stopped - along with all the other excessive net zero costs - that would really be sonething to get excited about.

WiserMiser

Scot_39 said:

- with network and wholeswle costs higher rue tipo net zero policybto - 

@Scot_39 Your posts would be SO much better if you edited them to remove all the typos.  Similarly, all that white space is unnecessary: you don't need an extra return at the end of a paragraph, it's added automatically.

Scot_39

WiserMiser said:

Scot_39 said:

- with network and wholeswle costs higher rue tipo net zero policybto - 

@Scot_39 Your posts would be SO much better if you edited them to remove all the typos.  Similarly, all that white space is unnecessary: you don't need an extra return at the end of a paragraph, it's added automatically.

Sorry phone keyboard is tiny - and it looks really ugly when entering posts without the extra returns.
I do sometimes go back and fix.

Ildhund

Scot_39 said:

The £150, at some average used by govt - not the standard Ofgem cap tdcv, is though weighted towards electric.

FYI, from Budget_2025_-_Data_Sources.pdf

Data sources

Measures to reduce energy bills

The £150 is a rounded £154 average per household figure. This is composed of a forecast £88 saving from funding 75% of the domestic share of the Renewables Obligation (RO) via the Exchequer, £59 is from not renewing the Energy Company Obligation (ECO), and £7 from VAT savings as a result of these measures.

The RO bills impact is obtained by dividing the total 25 forecast cost of the RO to households in GB in 2026/27 by the number of households in GB.

For ECO the average bill impact is the projected spending that would have happened on this scheme divided by the number of GB households.

The number of households in GB is taken from the ONS Living Costs and Food Survey for 2021-24 and this is grown in line with the OBR’s over 16 population determinant.

Ofgem’s energy bill price cap is measured for the current typical domestic consumption values for a dual fuel household – based on median consumption levels using data from 2019 and 2021 (these measures predominantly affect electricity bills). The impact is equivalent to £134 off the price cap (based on policy costs in the Q1 2026 dual fuel cap announced on 21 November 2025). This is composed of £67 for RO, £60 for ECO, and £6 of VAT savings (rounded to the nearest £1).