Email your MP asking for urgent reform of electricity pricing

Britain’s high electricity costs are pushing people into fuel poverty and holding back the green transition, while compounding the cost of living crisis.  

There is an urgent need to reform electricity pricing structures to reduce costs for consumers, while still providing enough profit to support investment and growth in the renewables sector.  

In Britain we currently pay more for electricity than almost anywhere else in Europe, due to social and environmental levies placed directly onto consumers’ electricity bills. These levies add around 16% to an average household’s annual electricity bill and are expected to rise over the next five years.   

These levies keep electricity prices artificially high, disincentivising the switch away from fossil fuels like gas and oil used for heating. Electric-powered heat pumps can be four times as efficient as a gas boiler, but because electricity costs around four times as much as gas in Britain, consumers don’t get the full savings that heat pumps can offer. So removing these additional costs from electricity would make heat pumps the cheapest option for heating your home, as well as cutting carbon emissions. 

And at the same time, moving these levies into general taxation would help tackle the fuel poverty that millions are currently facing. The most vulnerable, including the elderly, disabled people and people on low incomes in fuel poverty, are much more likely to have direct electric heating (for example electric radiators or fan heaters). So they pay proportionally far more in levies than those with gas boilers, meaning a greater impact on low-income families and those already in fuel poverty.   

The levies placed directly on electricity must go. The fairest and most sustainable thing to do is to move the cost into general taxation. This would mean savings of up to £300 a year for households with heat pumps or electric heating, and around £130 a year for dual fuel customers, while making sure those most able to pay do so, and the poorest people are protected.   

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