40% of homes face fuel crisis

TWO in every five households will be plunged into ‘fuel poverty’ this winter, an energy boss warned yesterday.

Michael Lewis, chief executive of E.ON UK, said the war in Ukraine has left families facing another huge rise in the energy price cap in October, and many will struggle to pay their bills.

He said the cap, which jumped by £700 in April to almost £2,000, was likely to rise by a similar amount again in the autumn.

Around one million of the firm’s eight million customers were already in arrears, he said – and predicted the figure would rise by 50 per cent this winter unless the Government steps in with a major financial package.

Mr Lewis told the BBC’s Sunday Morning: ‘We are seeing a significant number of people in fuel poverty, that is to say more than 10 per cent of their disposable income spent on energy, and that’s risen to around 20 per cent, and in October our model suggests it could rise to 40 per cent if the Government doesn’t intervene.’

Mr Lewis sidestepped questions about his own salary, which is reported to be around £1 million a year.