Fuel-poor households needed an extra £407 a year to escape fuel poverty in 2024.
OVO Energy issues £407 warning to ‘nine million households in England’
OVO has warned there are now nine million fuel-poor households in England, higher than at the height of the energy crisis. Fuel-poor households needed an extra £407 a year to escape fuel poverty in 2024.
That is a staggering 62 per cent jump since 2020, the report said. Ovo said it supported targeting households with unavoidable higher-than-average energy demand, such as those who live with disabilities, are older or live in high occupancy homes.
It urged the Labour Party Government and industry to work together to find a “better way” of identifying these customers in need, using data that existed across the public and private sector.
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With the Warm Home Discount primarily targeted at households receiving means-tested benefits, more support was needed for those on lower incomes struggling to pay bills but who did not receive benefits, OVO – which is rivalled by British Gas, EDF Energy, E ON Next, Octopus Energy and more – said.
Ovo chief executive David Buttress said: “Families cannot keep living on a knife edge, worrying how they will afford their bills each winter.
“With gas prices still volatile, this crisis will not fix itself. The Government has the power to change things, but only if it acts now to deliver a progressive and targeted social tariff.”
Shaun Spiers, executive director of Green Alliance, said: “Everyone has a right to a warm home in winter yet nine million households in England are still struggling to afford their energy bills following the fossil fuel price shock.
“The Government’s warm home discount provides a helping hand, but it has not kept pace with inflation and is only having a limited impact in reducing the number of households paying more than 10% of their income on gas and electricity bills.
“A social tariff could better protect households from volatile energy prices, which are a particular problem for those with low disposable incomes or unable to reduce their energy demand.
“With the increasingly unstable geopolitical environment affecting fossil fuel prices, there has never been a better time to ensure struggling households are properly insulated from volatile energy prices with a social tariff and warm home policies.”
