Stop consumer disconnections, says fuel poverty group

Consumers should have the right to not be disconnected from their electricity or gas supplies due to an inability to top up their pre-payment meters (PPMs), according to a fuel poverty campaign group.

Fuel Poverty Action (FPA) called on the government and energy suppliers to sign up to their “Energy Bill of Rights”, which states that to tackle fuel poverty a “right to affordable energy”, as well as preventing disconnections and self-disconnections was needed to tackle fuel poverty.

In 2012, more than half a million new prepayment meters were installed in the UK, bring the total up to seven million homes with PPMs installed, up 5 per cent on the previous year.

The Energy Bill of Rights also included: a shift towards renewable generation and away from fossil fuel generation; for the standing charge to be abolished; for PPMs not to be mandatory; for a growth in community energy; and for homes to be “properly insulated”.

FPA spokesperson Clare Welton said: “Everyone should have a right to access enough energy to fulfil their basic needs and keep themselves warm and healthy over the winter, yet energy companies’ profits and bad and non-existent energy policy currently dictates who lives and who dies every winter.

“An Energy Bill of Rights is essential to take back this power from energy companies- from the right they have to break into homes to install unwanted prepayment meters to the rights being given to frack under homes in communities that don’t want it- and give the rights and power to communities and individuals who desperately need an affordable, sustainable and publicly owned energy system.”

Last year, more than 10,000 people in the UK died as a direct result of fuel poverty, according to figures from the Office of National Statistics.