To go back to being terrified about energy bills from April.

[Thisismynamenow]

So Jeremy Hunt seems to have scrapped scaled back the energy scheme as of April, and moved to a targeted approach from them.

We are always over the threshold for means tested support but finances are always tight, so sounds like our prices will increase dramatically in April for energy again. Just in time for our nursery fees of well over £1000 per month to start.

I'm back to be terrified of how to afford it. We cut back as much as possible and don't plan on having the heating on until absolutely necessary, so can't cut anymore usage (we're below the average usage figures).

This government is absolutely useless and utterly destructive.

@BarbaraofSeville I'm not sure why you answered my post like that. I thought the "poor" made it clear that lots of these people have options but my point is won't they still be helped as the benefit is based on income not assets?

Yes, but there will be vast numbers of people who are far from owning mansions, but just miss out on the 'targeted support'...

Unless they go for a cap on the first XX amount of energy used... Which seems like a far more sensible and fairer way of calculating it.

Hopefully this will mean that interest rates don't need to rise as high as they otherwise might have though

That would indeed be the most sensible approach. So they almost certainly won't do that...

Will you need your heating on in April? Surely usage will be a lot lower then which will help.

Depends in the UK where you live.

Electricity is fairly constant year round for most people and even with the current cap, it costs twice as much as it did a year ago.

Removal of the current price protection could see the price double again and that's on top of mortgage interest rate increases that will hit a lot of people.

Yes, usage is lower over the summer, but what about next winter if the current price protection is removed?

... Yes, I wonder how many women are considering prostitution? I fucking hate this government.

I was being sarcastic because I was told to get cheaper childcare, that's the only option of cheaper childcare.

I was going to get my mil to watch him whilst im at home, but she's disabled and after a few trials it's too much for her and me, I'd be looking after her and my child.

So the childcare cost in general was unexpected let alone an increase in energy, groceries, mortgage (we were expecting it to come down when we remortgaged not remain the same).

I have a small 3 bed semi, I do have an office where I can retreat too but can't really leave him alone.

All designed to wipe out the middle class. There will only be poor and rich.

@FistFullOfRegrets thanks for reassurance, you're exactly right. We fixed our mortgage on the basis energy costs wouldn't change in 2 years, if we knew it was going to increase again I'd of extended my term on my mortgage to drop the payments.

But they guaranteed it would be stable and I wrongly trusted them, I'm sure lots of others will have made the same mistake.

Could be per average household use. With insulation / usage incentives.

This is what's happening in the Netherlands. They've taken the national average energy consumption over the last few years, and everyone will be entitled to that amount charged at the rate that was being charged in January 2022. Everything above that will be charged at the much higher price.

It means those in apartments or well insulated small homes will see little difference in their bills. Those in large houses will see a big difference. Should keep most people incentivised to lower consumption.

We're in a large house so we'll be hit big, but that's as it should be.

It wasn't a mistake, OP. You quite reasonably trusted the promises made to you by our national government in the previous Chancellor's mini budget. Those promises didn't come with a health warning that they might change their minds a couple of weeks later, and you acted reasonably and rationally on the basis of the situation at that time.

You have been terribly let down by Truss and her failure to do due diligence before making these promises to the electorate that she simply couldn't keep, but she is the one at fault here.... not you for trusting her.

Yeah really scared. We both work full time in lower middle income jobs. We have a household income of £48000
.We wont qualify for help but we are struggling already. I was very concerned to read this today.

X could be different for different properties, like on some articles they show the average for a flat terrace, 3 bed semi detached and so on. Heating is more about property size than number of people. Lighting is very cheap.

It's mostly hot water and cooking (if done separately like in a house share) that varies by number of people.

Hopefully if it is more adults in the house there will be more income? Won't help if it one adult and lots of children but maybe they'd get more help.

I remember the poll tax, we were two adults and the poll tax was roughly the same as we'd been paying in rates, nextdoor on one side was a widow on a pension and her bill went down, the other neighbours were mum, dad and 3 adult children and their bill went up massively but that seemed fair to me as they had 5 people working fulltime. Obviously my view was in the minority.

The poll tax was regressive. People who were well off in large expensive houses usually paid much less, while families with a couple of kids in a cheap terraced house paid more. It was unpopular because it was unfair. It also led to various young adults disappearing from the electoral register.

This

But asset rich pe shipments will get help won't they if their income is low?

pensioners!

FGS don't be bloody silly