Rural Wales is facing a Triple wammy, high petrol and diesel prices, rising electricity and dependence on heating oil, writes cllr Elwyn Vaughan.
Days after forecasters predicted annual household energy bills will climb to £3,420 this winter, BP, The British oil and gas giant announced the firm’s half-year profits of £11.9bn.
British Gas owner Centrica reported half year profits of £1.3bn. Shell, Europe’s largest oil company reported record profits of nearly £10bn for the April-to-June period.
As Greenpeace UK, said: “While households are being plunged into poverty with knock-on-impacts for the whole economy, fossil fuel companies are laughing all the way to the bank
And would anyone consider Norway – with one of the highest standards of livings on Earth – to be financially reckless. Yet its permanent windfall tax – worth 56% on top of corporation tax – means for every £100 they collect from barrels of oil in the North Sea, Britain collects just £8.
Britain is one of only two European nations to have entirely flogged off its transmission grid, with National Grid frittering away £1.4bn in dividends to shareholders in 2021 alone, instead of using it for investment?
France, where energy is publicly owned, their energy price cap has increased by just 4% - compared to an expected 150% here! As Ben Lake MP said; “Privatised energy companies ultimately exist to make a profit… When you look at other countries where publicly owned companies are playing more significant roles in the market, they are then able to limit price rises.”
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A third of rural homes in Wales do not have a mains gas supply and are dependent on heating oil, a cost which has doubled since the war started.
Yet Wales is a net exporter of electricity, consuming 14.7 TWh(1) of electricity in 2019, while generating approximately 27.9 TWh. While half a million people in Wales could find energy bills unaffordable by October, a charity has warned.
That is why i moved that Powys Council calls for a rural fuel levy relief for Mid Wales.
Likewise Plaid Cymru wants the levelling-up monies to invest in energy efficiency, funding retrofit measures, combating both the climate crisis and the cost-of-living crisis and that’s why we want to establish Ynni Cymru – Energy Wales , a Wales owned entity.
After all, who pays the piper calls the tune – that’s why we in Wales need to control our own assets.
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