Households paying £94 extra on energy bills due to regulator's failure

16 Nov 2022

Consumers have been forced to pay almost £100 more for their gas and electricity due to Ofgem's failure to regulate the energy supply market properly, according to a report by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

The report found that the collapse of 29 energy suppliers as prices spiked over the past year cost a total of £2.7 billion – or an average of £94 for every household in the country.

The government has already budgeted a further £1.9 billion to keep Bulb Energy running, with the final cost to taxpayers unknown until the company is sold.

Between the autumn of 2021 and the summer of 2022, wholesale prices for gas and electricity soared to as much as ten times their normal level. The surge in prices was unsustainable for a number of suppliers, whose charges to customers were capped by Ofgem.

Chair of the PAC, Dame Meg Hillier, said: 'It is true that global factors caused the unprecedented gas and electricity prices that have caused so many energy supplier failures over the last year, at such a terrible cost to households. But the fact remains that we have regulators to set the framework to shore us up for the bad times.

'Problems in the energy supply market were apparent in 2018 – years before the unprecedented spike in prices that sparked the current crisis, and Ofgem was too slow to act.'