"They're Going Up Again!" | Ofgem Price Cap Increases By 13% With An £18 Surge For Bills

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]We've also been talking about your energy bills. 13% rise on the way. The price cap has altered from July according to offjem. Uh let's speak with Cla Coutinho, shadow energy secretary, uh also shadow minister for equalities.

[00:00:12]Claire, good morning to you.

[00:00:15]>> Good morning.

[00:00:16]>> The good news just keeps on coming, right?

[00:00:20]>> Yes. Well, I mean what a horrible morning with the news of gold is green.

[00:00:23]I mean I mean look we don't know the cause of this one yet but we have seen this horrible rise of anti-semitism and people being targeted in this country because they're Jewish and it's just appalling. It it is totally appalling and um yes I'm I'm afraid to say what a what a sad morning to see yet more of these things happening to the Jewish community.

[00:00:45]>> Uh indeed. Um back to more of your brief energy. Um, of course this is um perhaps expected news, but it's massively significant. 13% rise, not a 3% or a 1, 13% rise in energy price cap from July.

[00:01:02]Cla Cinho.

[00:01:05]>> Well, I mean, this is the I think the the the horrors of Ed Miban's approach is that before we even met got to the Iran war, bills had already gone up by 200 because of the choices that he was making. Now we find oursselfves in a a crisis situation and energy bills are going up again. So it's piling yet more pain on consumers. Uh and that's why my argument has been for a long time now that we have to prioritize cheap energy.

[00:01:32]Uh because the world is getting more unstable. We need to make sure that we can have cheaper electricity in this country. We need to make sure that we think about our gas supply because we are going to need some gas going forward. Uh we need to double down on nuclear. And I'm afraid if we don't do those things, we are only going to become more reliant on others and we're going to become more vulnerable. And as I said, the world is getting more dangerous. We see that every single day.

[00:01:57]And we have to start completely changing our mindset uh of our energy system and what it's there to do.

[00:02:03]>> If the Conservatives were in power, Cla, my energy bill say 2000 a month uh thereabout and in winter it is sometimes more. Um, how quick could the Conservatives get that down to 100 a month?

[00:02:17]>> So, we've got two policies that we set out. Scrapping the carbon tax and these old wind subsidies that are in the system, which would cut electricity bills by 20%, we could do that immediately. Uh, and then over the long term, about 75% of your electricity bill, might be a bit different now because of the price gap, but roughly that amount is actually non-commodity costs. Uh and one of the things that you've seen just to explain this point is energy bosses have said even if gas went to zero then energy bills would still be going up by 2030 because of Ed's approach. So you have to take a different approach. You have to uh reduce those costs as much as possible.

[00:02:50]Take as many of these taxes and levies off of your electricity bill and bring down the cost of energy uh that you're buying in the wholesale market as well.

[00:02:58]So that's our our plan. That's why we've got a cheap power plan. Like I said, the immediate thing we'd be able to do is that 20% um uh bringing down of the cost of your electricity uh by cutting the carbon tax and renewable obligations. Uh but on top of that, you just have to keep prioritizing cheap energy in the system. Nuclear is one of the things I'm very passionate about. I think can do that uh and making sure that you're using the North Sea uh where where you can as well. Um but the the whole problem that we've got at the moment and one of the things that we've been talking about this morning is that we have almost a miserableist approach to energy which is making it uh harder for people to get. It's making it more expensive. It's making it more unreliable. And that's because we've prioritized decarbonization over cheap energy. And doing that over a number of years has left us in the position that we are now with some of the highest cost electricity anywhere in the developed world. We have to end that mindset. Just a final point on offgen. Um these are the uh obviously the people that oversee uh what our energy companies are doing and the like. I learned I didn't know this. You would know this because of course you've held this brief so you're aware of it. Apparently 2,000 people work at offjem and if you'd have asked me to take a guess I'd have said oh I don't know maybe 12 people sit there possibly half work from home. It's a little arrangement. They've got a little email set up, a WhatsApp group, and they make the magic happen. Why did 2,000 people work for our energy overseer?

[00:04:26]>> So, I've spoken about this before. When it started, it was 300 people. It's now ballooned to 2,000 people. So, when I was in government, I only had nine months, but I started a review of OffGEM. Uh because the other problem that you've got is it's meant to be focusing on consumers. The whole point of gem is that it priority should be consumers. But it I don't think that is the case anymore. I think actually its priority is net zero. And that's a problem. You need to have if you're going to have an energy regulator that looks at cost, a number one priority.

[00:04:55]The only priority it should have is focusing on those cost to consumers. But as the offjem numbers have grown and grown and grown, as you said, is 2,000 people now. Bills have just gone up and up and up. So we're clearly not getting bang for buck out of all the additional people going into offjem in terms of seeing lower bills. So again, when I talk about rewiring the energy system, you have to look at the regulators. You have to look at the incentives. That's the work that we're doing is serious uh and and hard work, but you've got to make the system work for consumers. At the moment, there is no voice uh in the industry that is actually putting consumers first. That's what we think politicians should be doing. That's why we focus on cheap power.

[00:05:34]>> Claire, thank you. Cla Cinho live from College Green, shadow energy secretary.

[00:05:39]She was, of course, previously under the last administration, the energy secretary. Thank you to her. 2,000 people work. I don't know what the collective wage bill is for that, but I reckon they could shave a quid off everyone's uh monthly bill if they closed the thing down and started again.

[00:05:52]2,000 regulators are work or 2,000 people work at the regulator. What on earth do they do? That is public money, by the way. And that's just one regulatory body among the dozens if not hundreds that the government have. They always expand. They never get small.

[00:06:08]There was never fewer of them. There's always more of them every flipping year.