Energy companies rake in £1bn a week as British families struggle in cost of

Energy companies raked in “eye-watering” profits of more than £1bn a week around the world last year as millions of hard-pressed Britons struggled to heat their homes or pay their bills in the ongoing cost of living crisis, The Independent can reveal.

Shell, Equinor, ExxonMobil and BP – some of the UK’s biggest suppliers of gas – made £65bn in net profits in 2023, leading campaigners to accuse the multinational firms of “stoking the energy bills crisis”.

Families have struggled to bear the rising costs, with an estimated 13 per cent of households in England in fuel poverty last year – up from 10.3 per cent in 2018, when higher energy prices started to squeeze incomes. Though regulator Ofgem has brought down the energy price cap to £1,690 from April, the rate is still far more than the £1,138 customers were paying before the energy crisis started in autumn 2021.

Gas and electricity prices have also risen by 19 per cent in real terms over the past year.

Critics hit out at the figures, which were revealed following an analysis by The Independent. Ed Miliband, the shadow secretary of state for climate change and net zero, said: “Labour’s plans will ensure that, while oil and gas giants are making eye-watering profits from the cost of living crisis, they pay more towards the delivery of cleaner and cheaper energy.

“We will set up a publicly owned company, Great British Energy, which will support the creation of thousands of clean energy jobs and help deliver clean energy by 2030.”

Simon Francis, coordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said: “Rather than putting customers first, households have been left to build up record levels of energy debt or suffer living in cold, damp homes.

“Meanwhile, politicians in their Westminster bubble stand on the sidelines, trading insults and trying to barter down on the amount of money they are prepared to spend to fix Britain’s broken energy system.”

The Liberal Democrats said that huge profits for oil and gas giants showed that the government should have put in a proper windfall tax.

A windfall tax is levied on profits a company makes as a result of factors outside of its control. Gas prices have soared after Western countries sanctioned Russia following its attack on Ukraine. Russia in turn slashed its gas output. This meant more demand for less available gas, resulting in higher prices and better profits for gas producers. The government introduced a windfall tax in 2022, but said last year that it would come to an end if wholesale prices came down. Critics say the policy needs to be tougher.

Keith Butler, 72, and his partner Helen, 64, are full-time carers for their adopted 22-year-old son Geordie. Geordie is deaf, blind and autistic, and the electrical equipment he needs means the family’s energy use is already high.

Mr Butler said they are facing a “double whammy” of high energy bills and having to survive on the income from his pension. Geordie is fed by a machine that needs to be powered, has an electric bed, and likes to watch videos and TV to keep entertained, all of which require electricity.

The Butlers are not alone in their struggles. The proportion of families who spent more than 10 per cent of their income, after housing costs, on energy bills also increased to 36 per cent last year, up from 27 per cent the previous year. Gas and electricity prices also rose by 19 per cent in real terms over the year, figures from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero show.

Mr Butler told The Independent: “To pay the utility bills, we’ve had to cut back. We don’t have holidays any more. I don’t really go out at night because I can’t afford it.

“We just had a gas bill for £450 for the last quarter, and imagine what it would have been if I hadn’t been trying to cut down. I’m trying my best, but our bills are creeping up all the time.”

Mr Butler wants the government to introduce a reduced energy tariff for vulnerable families, and is also critical of the energy companies who are making big profits from customers like him.

Tom Marsland, of disability charity Sense, which has supported the family with a one-off cash payment, said: “It’s difficult to hear about massive profits at energy companies when we know so many disabled households are struggling to pay for the basics after huge increases to their energy bills.

“Our research has found over half…