WITH just days to go until voters head to the polls, tens of thousands of them have been dealt a brutal reminder that the cost-of-living crisis will get worse before it gets better.
SSE Airtricity and Budget Energy’s hikes of 33 and 27 per cent will see the average domestic electricity customer pay in excess of £1,000 per year to power their home.
In the case of Budget Energy, which has 90,000 customers, the Consumer Council say the average annual bill will be closer to £1,400.
Fifteen years ago, a household in the north could have expected to pay less than £400 a year on electricity.
For the suppliers, the song remains the same. The price of wholesale natural gas, which accounts for a large chunk of electricity tariffs, has surged since last year, with the market extremely volatile.
European gas prices have soared again this week after Russia halted supply to both Poland and Bulgaria.
Consumer watchdogs have been warning us to brace for a few years of elevated energy prices.
The price of home heating oil, used two-thirds of homes in the north, has also crept back up over the past two weeks.
Based on what the Consumer Council tells us the average family consumes in a year, an annual oil bill could be between £2,220 and £2,500 at current prices.
Coupled with the latest electricity hikes, it could see many households in Northern Ireland facing annual energy bills in excess of £3,000, perhaps even £4,000.
For context, the energy price cap in Britain (even after the latest hike) is around £2,000.
In the run up to Thursday’s poll, political parties have been promising new energy support payments to help households manage.
It may help some in the short-term. But with UK inflation to hit nine per cent this year and prices steadily climbing, consumer confidence will suffer.
The growing consensus is that we may be heading for another recession in the not too distant future.
