London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Oct 10, 2025

Energy bills forecast to remain above £2,000 in blow to Sunak’s loan scheme

Energy bills forecast to remain above £2,000 in blow to Sunak’s loan scheme

Analysts warn that prices will stay higher for longer, adding pressure to struggling households
Energy bills will stay well above £2,000 for two more years, according to leading analysts, who warned that prolonged high prices threaten the chancellor Rishi Sunak’s loan scheme to help households cope with sky-high gas prices amid the mounting cost of living crisis.

Cornwall Insights, which predicted the recent 54% rise in the cap on average energy bills to £1,971, said it had increased its forecasts for upcoming changes to the ceiling, which is determined by the energy regulator, Ofgem.

It warned that prices staying higher for longer would undermine Sunak’s plan to ease the pressure on household finances by giving bill payers a one-off £200 discount on bills, paid back in £40 instalments over five years.

Cornwall left its prediction for the coming winter unchanged, estimating that the price cap will hit £2,607, meaning households will have seen their bills double in the space of a year. While it expects the cap to fall from that record high, it no longer expects a significant drop.

Its forecast for the winter period starting in 2023 is now £2,284, up from a prediction of £2,040 made at the end of March. Cornwall analysts believe the price cap will still be as high as £2,233 by spring 2024.

The change comes after gas prices stopped dropping sharply and began to level off, with the risk now weighted towards further increases.

Craig Lowrey, the principal consultant at Cornwall Insight, urged the government to come up with new measures to help households cope with bills and reconsider its omission of energy efficiency from Boris Johnson’s energy security strategy, unveiled last week.

“The cheapest energy is that which you don’t use, so to reduce bills for consumers, the government really must look again at how to support reductions in energy consumption for all consumers, including those in fuel poverty,” Lowery said.

“The exclusion of material new policies for energy efficiency in the energy security strategy were a missed opportunity. While the government has already offered some support for consumers to pay their energy bills this year, this was before forecasts began predicting further rises, and over a longer period.

“It is possible the government could take further action in the autumn, but we have no guarantees that further support will be forthcoming.

“Of course, many of the variables which drive our forecasts can change before the cap setting periods for next year, but the risk is weighted to the upwards rather than downwards pressure on the price cap right now.

“And with costs of living rising, and inflation hitting a record high in March before the cap rise of 1 April feeds through, then even the potential for these sorts of cap levels to arise in 2023 will be concerning for hard hit households.”
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
California County Reinstates Mask Mandate in Health Facilities as Respiratory Illness Risk Rises
Israel and Hamas Agree to First Phase of Trump-Brokered Gaza Truce, Hostages to Be Freed
French Political Turmoil Elevates Marine Le Pen as Rassemblement National Poised for Power
China Unveils Sweeping Rare Earth Export Controls to Shield ‘National Security’
The Davos Set in Decline: Why the World Economic Forum’s Power Must Be Challenged
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
×