Martin Lewis has warned people claiming State Pension could lose one third of their annual benefit on energy bills.
The UK is currently facing a cost-of-living crisis as energy bills skyrocketed by 54% in April when Ofgem lifted the price cap. The increase has meant the typical bill has surged from £1,277 to £1,925 a year.
Ofgem's chief executive said in late May that a typical household would pay £800 a year more from October. However, Jonathan Brearley has now warned the price of energy bills in winter is predicted to rise faster than expected.
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Martin Lewis has been providing people with financial advice to navigate their way through this crisis. The Money Saving Expert has warned new data published by energy analysts suggests that Ofgem’s price cap is set to rise by 64 per cent from October 1, taking the annual cost for a typical user on a standard tariff to £3,245. Cornwall Insight also said the price cap could go up by a further £360 in January to £3,364 - as The Daily Record reports.
He told told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme that it is going to be a “very bleak winter” and urged the government to re-evaluate their financial support package. He said: "The rise in prediction from the May period alone when the Chancellor at the time, Rishi Sunak, set the help package, is £450 which is bigger than every household was going to be given then.
“And just to give you one more statistic that really nails this, somebody on a typical State Pension gets around £9,500 a year, £3,245 is a third of that.
“This isn’t the mortgage, this isn’t the rent, this is the energy bill alone is likely to be bigger than a third of the State Pension, which means the help packages that were in place are not longer fit for purpose and we need a government, active, educated with ministers who have had time to get hold of their brief as soon as possible.”
Martin added that the only way we will see lower bills than the predicted £3,245 and prevent people from having to choose between “starving and eating this winter” is by governmental action.
He said: “This is a genuine, urgent emergency. Millions of households will be forced into poverty unless we act more, it will be devastating for people.”
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