Price crap!
ANOTHER increase in the combined gas and electricity price cap has been decreed by regulator Ofgem, with further rises forecast next year.
Energy secretary Ed Miliband has again blamed this on “the wholesale price of gas”. But wholesale prices have fallen by more than a third since February, so Miliband’s one-liner doesn’t explain successive recent increases in the cap. Gas also constantly gets the rap from Miliband for “setting the price of electricity too often”. But householders know they can choose a fixed-price tariff for electricity from their supplier for a year or more ahead; industrial buyers do the same; and Ofgem periodically fixes the electricity price cap according to a complex formula which doesn’t directly feature the price of gas at all. So, the price-setting accusation can’t be about retail prices. What’s going on?