Suffering from angina and arthritis, and with poor mobility, widower Barry Seckerson needs to keep his home warm. But this winter that has come at an enormous price. His British Gas bill for the latest quarter is £1171, for which he will be forced to dip in to his funeral fund.
While he does that, Chris O’Shea, the CEO of British Gas parent company Centrica, is trying to decide whether to take the bonus of up to £1.6million he is due after the firm made profits of £3.3billion, reports The Mirror.
Fife-born O’Shea will still be due his bonus despite last week’s revelations that British Gas agents with warrants were breaking into the homes of vulnerable people to force-fit prepayment meters, which mean customers are cut off if they fail to pay.
Charities, politicians and unions condemned the “obscene” Centrica profits, saying they were built on the backs of vulnerable people “living in cold, damp homes”. Retired construction worker Barry, from Stoke-on-Trent, has been a British Gas customer for more than 50 years.
His latest bill is four times the £266 he paid in the previous quarter. He was horrified to find he must pay £1171 by February 20.
Barry, whose wife Brenda died 10 years ago, said: “Because it was winter I was expecting it to be £400, maybe £500, but never that much. I can pay this bill but I will have to use some of the money I have in savings.
“It is money I put aside to cover the cost of my funeral.”
He is dreading April, when energy bills are set to jump again after the Tories scale back universal support.
He branded Centrica’s profits “disgusting” and a “scandal”, and criticised O’Shea’s bonus, saying: “I don’t know how he would have the cheek to take it. My bill is part of what is paying for it.”
O’Shea, who waived his £1.1million bonus last year, said yesterday that it was “too early to have a conversation” about his latest. It will be revealed in Centrica’s annual report, due next month.
Defending the £3.3billion profit, O’Shea, 49, said: “Profits at Centrica have a purpose, and that purpose is net zero, that purpose is helping customers having lower bills going forward.”
But while British Gas customers see no end in the struggle to pay rocketing bills, Centrica’s profits mean it is making abut £100 a minute and it has rewarded investors by announcing £723million worth of dividends and share buybacks, including a new £300million boost.
That was 10 times the £75million British Gas spent “supporting” customers last year. Centrica’s record profits – equivalent to almost £6300 a minute or £104 a second – were due to the rise in wholesale energy prices after Russia’s invasion in Ukraine and a surge in energy bills for ordinary households.
Ed Miliband, Labour’s Shadow Climate Change and Net Zero Secretary, said: “It cannot be right that, as oil and gas giants rake in the windfalls of war, Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives refuse to implement a proper windfall tax that would make them pay their fair share.
“In a matter of weeks, the Government plans to allow the energy price cap to rise to £3000. Labour would use a proper windfall tax to stop prices going up in April.”
TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak said: “Britain’s energy market is broken. While millions of families struggle to heat their homes, firms like Centrica are raking in monster profits.
“It is time to bring energy retail companies into public ownership.”
Simon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said Centrica’s profits were “built on the backs of young families, older people and the disabled living in cold damp homes.”
Tom Marsland, policy manager at disability equality charity Scope, said: “It’s obscene that energy companies continue to make massive profits as disabled people face devastating situations because they can’t afford enough energy.”
Chris Hayes, from the Common Wealth think tank, said O’Shea’s bonus “would not be justified at all” on moral as well as other grounds. Most of the £3.3billion profit came from Centrica’s gas production, its stake in nuclear power plants and its energy trading arms.
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