Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate he has made of (a) how many prepayment energy meters there are in (i) St Helens and (ii) Merseyside and (b) what proportion of those are in households.
Answered by Graham Stuart
BEIS produced a one-off publication in March 2019 of annual prepayment meter electricity statistics for Great Britain by country, English regions and local authority. These statistics cover electricity prepayment meters which have a domestic meter profile in 2017.
Data on regional variation of payment method (prepayment, direct debit or credit) for domestic standard electricity customers, domestic economy 7 electricity customers and domestic gas customers is published in Quarterly Energy Prices table 2.4.2, table 2.4.3 and table 2.5.2.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many businesses in St Helens have received the Government energy subsidy.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The Energy Bill Relief Scheme (EBRS) provides a discount on the wholesale element of gas and electricity bills to ensure that all eligible small businesses that receive their energy from licensed suppliers, are protected from high energy costs over the winter period. The EBRS discount is applied directly to the energy bills of eligible businesses by their energy providers. Therefore the Government does not currently have a breakdown of support received by location.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate his Department has made of the effect of rising energy prices on the number of households in fuel poverty in (a) St Helens North constituency, (b) St Helens Metropolitan Borough and (c) the Liverpool City Region.
Answered by Greg Hands
The estimated projections for fuel poverty in England in 2022 can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/annual-fuel-poverty-statistics-report-2022.
The latest subregional statistics are for 2020, and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/sub-regional-fuel-poverty-2022.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to help (a) the UK glass industry and (b) other energy-intensive industries meet the challenges of rising wholesale energy costs.
Answered by Greg Hands
The Government recognises this is a worrying time for businesses facing pressures due to the significant increases in global gas prices and its impact on electricity and carbon prices.
My Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State has met representatives of the UK’s high energy-using sectors including the glass industry in the past months in order to understand the impact on their business, and extensive engagement with industry continues across government at both a ministerial and official level. The Government’s priorities are to ensure costs can be managed and supplies of energy are maintained.
Many high energy-using businesses will have hedging strategies in place which help to shield them from exposure to the gas and electricity price rises, while some may be more reliant on current market prices.
To help ensure our economy remains strong and competitive, between 2013 and 2020, total relief to energy intensive industries for electricity policy costs of over £2billion was provided. This helped over 250 businesses across the UK, including 12 glass companies. In 2020 alone, the Government provided relief to Employment Investment Initiatives for electricity policy costs worth over £470million.
In 2018, the Government announced £315 million of funding for the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund, which will support businesses with high energy use to cut their bills until 2024.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what recent assessment he has made of the potential effect of the prospective removal of the Energy Company Obligation scheme on levels of (a) fuel poverty and (b) domestic energy efficiency in (i) St Helens North constituency, (ii) the North West and (iii) England.
Answered by Greg Hands
The Government keeps all costs on bills under review; We consulted on extending ECO from 2022-26 and expanding it to £1bn per year, supporting low income and vulnerable households across Great Britain. We will issue a response to the ECO4 consultation in due course.