100,000 ‘will not be able to pay bills’

More than 100,000 people in the region will not have the cash to meet basic living expenses as winter starts to bite, according the charity National Energy Action, which says families could be up to £778 per month short.

MORE THAN 100,000 people in the region will not have the cash to meet basic living expenses as winter starts to bite, according to new research.

Charity National Energy Action has calculated that families in fuel poverty could be up to £778 per month (£9,331 a year) short of money needed to pay for the basic essentials, including energy.

The charity, which has flagged up concerns over the impact of the roll-out of universal credit, the Government’s flagship welfare reform, said people were already making stark choices – turning off the heating for the entire winter, with children eating just one meal a day – or building up ever-greater debts.

This week it emerged that hundreds of tenants in Grimsby had been issued pre-emptive notices of eviction in anticipation of delays in the payment of welfare payments causing them to enter arrears.

Peter Smith, National Energy Action’s Director of Policy and Research, said: “Our new report highlights the scale of the impossible choices that over 106,606 families in Yorkshire and the Humber will be making this winter.

“The report illustrates the catastrophic impact universal credit could have on these families who have no savings to insulate them from falling into debt, going hungry and not heating their homes over the current six-week waiting period.

“We aren’t talking about needing to cut down on a few luxuries; we’re seeing people switch off the heating for the whole winter and kids only eating one meal a day.

“We know others are adopting unsafe behaviours in an attempt to keep warm, withdrawing entirely from society or building up bigger and bigger debt problems.”

The report also warns many low-income and vulnerable consumers who miss out on current support such as the Warm Home Discount will not benefit from the proposed safeguard price cap this winter.

Mr Smith said: “NEA supports the safeguard tariff and welcomes Ofgem’s efforts to take immediate action to protect a sub-set of vulnerable energy customers this winter.

“We estimate, however, that over half a million households nationally will each miss out on up to £260 of energy bill savings.

“These households are mostly working-age, fall into the lowest income deciles and in some cases are already facing thousand-pound gaps between their incomes and the essential cost of living.”

The charity is calling for five key actions, including preventing the situation where a family starting on universal credit – which currently has a minimum sixweek wait for payments – spending Christmas “with no income; not heating, not eating, just trying to survive.”

Last month, the Work and Pensions Committee described the 42-day wait as a “major obstacle” to the policy’s success.

It found the delay caused claimants to run up debts and/or turn to food banks. It said: “Most low-income families simply do not have the savings to see them through such an extended period.”

On Wednesday it was revealed that a Grimsby-based letting agent had sent letters to tenants, containing “Notices To Quit”, warning that it could not “sustain arrears at the potential levels universal credit could create.”

Great Grimsby MP Melanie Onn, who passed the letter to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn following complaints from tenants, said it was “even clearer evidence that the universal credit roll-out will push more people into debt, evictions and homelessness.”

Universal credit roll-out will push more people into debt. Great Grimsby MP Melanie Onn.