BP has announced record underlying profits of $6.2 billion for the first three months of this year - despite the cost of living crisis worsening for millions of Brits.
The energy company, which is based in London but operates worldwide, announced the results yesterday. Its underlying profit was up from $4.1bn for the previous three months.
However, BP overall actually made a loss - due to its decision to pull out of a Rosneft, a Russian energy company in which it held an interest. That decision, which followed Russia's invasion of Ukraine, has cost BP $25.5bn in the short term.
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Good Morning Britain reported yesterday that 77-year-old Elsie is being forced to ride a bus all day to keep warm because she can't afford her heating bills. Host Susanna Reid said soaring energy bills have forced her to cut down to one meal a day and resort to travelling on buses to stay out of her home and keep bills down. Elsie's energy bills have soared from £17 a month to £85 a month
Nevertheless, BP is a very profitable company, with wholesale gas and oil prices soaring around the world meaning it is making more money than it expected when selling that fuel on to energy providers that supply our homes. And those record underlying profits have led to calls for a windfall tax on the global corporations to grow ever louder.
Ed Miliband, the Labour MP and shadow energy secretary, said: “Yet again we see the oil and gas companies making billions upon billions of profits coming directly from the pockets of the British people and the government shamefully refuses to act.
“The oil and gas firms may be doing their job for the shareholders of their companies but the government is negligently failing to do its job for the people of this country. The refusal to levy a windfall tax to help cut energy bills is deeply wrong, unfair, and tells you all you need to know about whose side this government is on - and it’s not the British people."
The prime minister, Boris Johnson, has repeatedly ruled out a windfall tax on the oil and gas giants, saying it would discourage the companies from investing in the UK. However, Bernard Looney, the BP chief executive, told the Times his company would still invest the same amount of money in the UK regardless of whether the government imposes a windfall tax.
Asked which investments BP would not make in the case of a windfall tax being imposed, Looney said: “There are none that we wouldn’t do.” The company had previously announced £18bn investments in the UK during this decade, and these will still happen no matter what, Looney said.
Meanwhile, the energy price cap for British consumers is at a record high of £1,971 per year. It's predicted to rise again in October.
