Crisis, i think, where we can no longerjustify letting them get away with that. While vulnerable families are pushed to the brink. Theyre raising their prices and theyjust dont understand that for us electricity is the difference between life and death. It is an Essential Need for ourfamily and our child. One, two, three, four, five. Lauren lives in birmingham with her partner sam and their two year old son arlo. Shes a Primary School teacher, and hes an illustrator. They take home just above the average Household Income of £31,000. But thats no longer enough. Petrol has gone up a lot. We are spending a lot more to get and from work now. Nursery fees have gone up. 0ur rent has gone up. And our gas and electric has gone up probably the most, hasnt it . Yes. So, a year ago we were paying about £100 a month, and now it is £250 a month for our gas and electric. So, its really hiked up. It has a really long neck that goes down. Its at the point now where we feel like we are kind of scraping at the barrel we are being as sensible as we can. But it is just getting tighter and tighter. Heart breaking, isnt it . We work every day and then at the end of the month it all disappears. Uk gas and Electricity Prices have already doubled in the past year. Theyre expected to rise to more than £5,000 a year in january. Could you afford that . I dont think we will be able to. No. We are already at our limit with the energy bill at the minute and we cant afford any more. And to think about it going up again, you just feel really helpless. The uk is the hardest hit country in western europe. More than half of households are expected to be pushed into fuel poverty. I think were entering into a Real National emergency now. Weve already seen around 7 Million People not able to afford all the essentials, so people who are having to skip meals, not be able to have showers, afford toiletries, cant heat their homes properly. Its going to be an absolutely catastrophic winter unless the government steps in. The crisis started with increased demand for energy as the world came out of lockdown. Then russia invaded ukraine, and the gas price spiralled further. Prices had already increased before the war. And then when russia invaded ukraine in february 2022, prices went up even more. So its an unprecedented sequence of events that starts from covid and ends with the war in ukraine. The impact of soaring gas and Electricity Prices will be felt by every one of us. This year, uk households are expected to pay over £100 billion more for their energy than they did last year. Its an incredible sum of money. So wheres all that extra cash going . Unlike much of europe, the uk isnt dependent on russian gas. Our biggest foreign supplier is norway. We paid the norwegians an extra £8 billion in the First Six Months of this year. And the cost of gas has soared since then. Norways state owned Energy Company tweeted its Financial Results with emojis of bags of cash. The norwegians are already the equivalent of the Saudi Arabian oil sheikhs, wearing jeans. In simple terms, norway provides somewhere in the region of 25 to 30 of our gas. And the wholesale price of that gas has gone up five times from its average level. So simple arithmetic says that, that, er, the norwegians are making five times as much revenue from, gb consumers as they might have been two or three years ago. British oil and Gas Companies are cashing in too. But theyre not owned by the state. So shareholders, including pension funds, are getting big payouts. Between april and june this year, bp made nearly £7 billion in profit. Its rival, shell, did even better with a profit of £91; billion injust three months. Thats more than a £100 million a day. The biggest winners in these crises are the oil and gas producers. No question about that. Any big Energy Price Crisis Results in a massive transfer from the consumers to the producers of those fossil fuels. By and large you are talking about the Big Companies getting a lot richer on the back of people who have to pay for the energy they need. And its kind of as simple as that at one level. Over the past year, bp has returned almost £10 billion to shareholders in dividends and share buy backs. Its boss has described the company as a cash machine. Today we have High Oil Prices and a few things happen when the price of oil is high. Number one, we do make more profits, as you have seen this morning that we can use to reward our shareholders. And shell has returned £15 billion to shareholders in the last year. 0n the back of robust operational performance, our strategy is delivering for our shareholders. Both shell and bp say they will be providing Financial Support for people struggling this winter. And that they are investing billions in the uk to deliver lower carbon energy. But the crisis in the Energy Market has delivered a windfall for the Energy Producers. Bp and shell have operations all over the world but some of their huge profits come from oil and gas here in the north sea. The north sea still provides half of the uks gas. Much of it comes ashore here at shells Bacton Gas Plant in norfolk. So what happens down here . Theres eight pipelines going into bacton from the gas rigs in the north sea. Um, its a 24 hour operation. Its a major employer around this area, as well. They take the gas in there and then pipe it off to other places. In may, the government announced a windfall tax an additional 25 on profits from north sea oil and gas. It is possible to both tax extraordinary profits fairly and incentivise investment. So we will introduce a temporary targeted Energy Profits levy. The government says the new tax will increase investment and raise £5 billion over the next year. But critics say the tax isnt all it seems. Dan neidle is a labour supporting lawyer. He used to be head of tax at one of the citys biggest legal firms. So, this tax, its often called a windfall tax. Its not strictly a windfall tax because its not retrospective. Its a tax that applies going forward. So most of the massive profits from the six months of this year arent touched. Correct. The windfall tax also has an Investment Allowance which is intended to encourage investment. The problem is the time horizon of the windfall tax is so limited, its very unlikely it will encourage any investment. So all the Investment Allowance is doing is throwing money away. Its a dead weight cost and we can estimate reasonably conservatively that the minimum cost of that is £3. 2 billion. It is impossible tojustify oil and Gas Companies making massive profits, while households all across the country are looking at energy bills that they cant afford, so, there is clearly a need to help offset some of that real suffering and frankly, despair, that families are going to be pushed into as a result of exactly the same dynamics that are causing unexpected and indeed record profits for the oil and gas industry. Customers dont buy gas and electricity from the likes of bp and shell. They pay Energy Suppliers who have bought it on the open market. Some suppliers have been accused of cashing in too. Its quite a lot, isnt it . They are saying there that prices are going to rise by 12 . In south wales, liz bergelin and her husband pete use british gas. Shes a childminder and hes a lecturer. It is going to be a tough time. They earn around the average Household Income. And theyre worried about their energy bill. Every month you are looking, are we going to have enough money to pay all the bills at the end of the day and keep a roof over our heads . And if it increases by £100, £200, then where are we going to find those extra pounds . Its a lot. So what are you going to do if you cant find the extra . I really dont know how we are going to manage, to be fair. Its going to be a difficult time, definitely. Liz would like to find a fixed rate energy deal to protect her against further price rises. So this came through at the beginning of august. But she says the deals on offer from Energy Suppliers are far too expensive. So i had an emailfrom british gas which basically gave me the reassurance of being able to come into a fixed rate tariff. So this is what we are paying, about £3,000, so which is about £250 a month, but i could be reassured and fix my prices in forjust over £8000 a year. Thats astronomical what did you think when you opened that . How can you justify such a massive hike in your fixed rate tariff . How can you justify £8,000 . Its ridiculous. Centrica, the company that owns british gas, says fixed rate offers are based on projections as to where prices will go. It says it will use 10 of british gas profits to help customers who need it the most. And that its making long Term Investments to support the uks Energy Security and resilience. There is a limit on the amount Energy Suppliers in Great Britain can charge customers. The Regulator 0fgem sets a maximum price for each unit of gas and electricity. Accompany but the price cap keeps going up. 0fgem says it has to allow Energy Suppliers to put up their bills in line with the rising cost of gas. If it doesnt raise the price cap, suppliers will go bust. 29 of them have already gone under since the crisis started. But one of 0fgems directors has resigned in protest. This is herfirst interview. The 0fgem board has to weigh up a number of competing desirable things when it takes decisions on the price cap. One is keeping the market reasonably stable, but another one is obviously protecting the interests of consumers. My view was that the top priority to protect consumers this winter was to keep bills as low as possible and thats not the decision that the board took. The board took the decision to actually allow suppliers to claw back more funds on bills, to get them through this very difficult period. I couldnt agree with that. Is the price cap fit for purpose . The price cap was invented to deal with yesterdays problem, and it really isnt fit for dealing with todays problem, which is extremely high and volatile energy prices, because it cant reduce the wholesale price. Its only dealing with the retail bit of the market. So i think now we need a completely different set of solutions in order to protect consumers and, in my view, only government can actually provide those solutions. 0fgem says its working with the government and industry to find solutions, and is doing Everything Possible to protect customers. Ten days ago, another rise in the price cap was announced. Millions of households in england, scotland and wales will see their energy bills soar by 80 after the regulator. Shocking. Raised its price cap. Liz is still on a variable rate, so her bills are going up again. Now in october, that willjump to £3549 a year. It will be bigger than our mortgage. We will maybe able to have support from otherfamily members, you know, but at the same time, you dont want to be doing that calling on people in your family to help pay your regular household bills. That just doesnt sit well at all. Its not what people should be doing. They shouldnt be looking to get a loan to pay their energy bills. Its just not. It� s not right. Its notjust the price of gas thats spiralling the price of electricity increased five fold in a year, from £80 a megawatt hour to around £1100. The steep rise in Electricity Prices makes sense if its powered by expensive gas. But more than half the uks electricity comes from other power sources, like nuclear or renewables. So why� s that gone up too . This graph shows whats going on. It doesnt matter how electricity is produced. It always tracks the price of gas. I think what many people find surprising is that the 40 of our electricity that we get from gas sets the price on the whole electricity market. So when the price of gas goes up, the price of electricity goes up too. And because the price of gas has gone up five times or so, the price of electricity has gone up by a similar amount. It Means Companies that make electricity without using gas can make a killing. This is sizewell b, in suffolk. 15 of the uks electricity comes from Nuclear Plants like this one. The cost of Generating Electricity from Nuclear Power isnt really going up. But the market price for electricity has skyrocketing. It means a windfall for the Nuclear Industry. Edf the French Company that owns our Nuclear Power stations hasnt made a big profit yet. Its locked into long term Sales Contracts at much lower prices. But as these contracts end, edf will be able to sell electricity for far more than it costs to make. You can see the profits to be made by looking at edf� s business partner, centrica. Its also selling some of that nuclear electricity. And the price its charging has already doubled in the past year. Its helped centricas overall profits rise five fold over the same period. Both Companies Say nuclear is a long Term Investment and that profits should not be assessed on a short term basis. The Nuclear Industry is doing very well at the moment. We dont know from exactly what contracts theyve entered into. We would certainly expect that the Nuclear Generators are making much higher profits than they would do normally. Its really as simple as that. Its a similar story with wind farms. Modern wind farms can make a megawatt hour of electricity for less than £50. But you can currently sell that megawatt hour for many times that price on the open market, so there are extraordinary profits to be made. The government says its looking at ways to decouple Electricity Prices from the price of gas. But theres no quick fix, even though were all paying so much. Weve made some estimates of how much the revenues in the Electricity Sector have increased. Roughly, we find the revenues going to wholesale generators went up from about 1k, £14. 5 billion in 2019, to 30 billion by 2021, and our estimate is that will close to double again. Almost certainly this year over £50 billion. Now, some of that is taken up genuinely by the increased cost of running gas plants. But i think it is quite clear that if the Electricity System reflected the average cost of making the stuff, it would save consumers at least 10 billion a year. Some wind farms arentjust profiting from sky high prices theyre getting hand outs on top. The government brought in the subsidies 20 years ago to encourage green energy. They add another £6 billion a year to our electricity bills. For those renewable generators that got into the early subsidy system, theyve got two income streams. Theyre selling into the wholesale market, but theyve also got the contract that guarantees them a subsidy on top of that from every unit of Renewable Energy they sell. So, yeah, those renewable generators are doing extremely well now. 0ne company doing particularly well is greencoat uk wind. It has stakes in 38 wind farms that get the green subsidy, like this one in south wales. Greencoat can now get about four times as much for its electricity as it did a year ago. Thats a huge windfall profit, and the Company Still gets the subsidies from our energy bills on top of that. Greencoat stands to get millions of pounds in subsidies this year, while the companys profits more than quadrupled to £550 million. Greencoat says it pays a fixed dividend to shareholders and all remaining cash is reinvested into further Renewables Capacity in the uk. The company says it has invested over £4. 5 billion and plays a crucial role in the uk . S long term Energy Security and low carbon transition. Its the most vulnerable families who are paying the price of the uks energy crisis. How are you doing . Youre relaxing, are you . Dan cares for his nine year old daughter, elisa, in bournemouth. She has a severe form of cerebral palsy. Good girl. Um, so elisa has various medication throughout the day. So, she has them all directly into her stomach using a button. Is that nice . The machines that keep her alive all use electricity. And the familys bill has trebled in a year. So we can afford to pay for the bills that keep elisa alive, which about works if the bill stays like this it about works. But not for long, especially if theres going to be another price hike. We cant shave off anything any more, so i dont know what we are going to do then. 0ur Dependency is total. We cant shave off anything from what we need for elisa. So lets say we cant afford to feed her through the feed pump she would starve. Thats the only way to feed her, through the button. So all of this equipment, they are a lifeline for her they literally keep her alive. We need them. So i might have to put some oxygen on in a moment cos her Saturation Levels are dipping a little bit. Its probably because shes starting to fall asleep. Theyre raising their prices and theyjust dont understand that for us, electricity is the difference between life and death. Theyre raising their prices and theyjust dont understand that for us, electricity is the difference between life and death. If prices keep rising, they may not be able to afford to care for elisa at home. Im worried, if there is going to be another price hike, i am worried that we cant keep elisa home. That. Because we need to look at as much as we would love to have her home we need to look at where she is the safest, and if we cant afford our bills then she would be safest in a hospital where the equipment is there, that she needs. I dont we dont want that to happen but if there is no other option, then that might happen. The government says its £37 billion package of help will see most people receive a £400 discount on their energy bills, and that one in four uk households will see £1200 extra support. It says ministers are discussing ways to ensure markets function effectively for consumers. Britains new Prime Minister has promised tax cuts and a plan within the next week to deal with soaring energy costs. But liz truss has ruled out further Windfall Taxes on the Energy Companies. And how do you feel when you hear the news, that these Energy Producers are making eye watering profits . It makes you so angry. I whats their profit going to be | in the winter when they hike up all of our prices and we cant afford our energy bill any. More . Itsjust disgusting. The energy Companies Say theyre concerned about customers and have put forward plans to ease the crisis. But the profits of some Companies Look set to rise still further. I think its quite obscene for Energy Companies to be posting profits in the billions when we are struggling to actually pay their bills. And i think Energy Companies are isolated from the reality of a family like ours. This is bbc news. Im david eades. Our top stories a new Prime Minister in number 10. Liz truss promises a bold plan to see britain through a range of challenges. I am confident that together we can ride out the storm, we can rebuild our economy, and we can become the modern, Brilliant Britain that i know we can be. The Un Security Council meets in Emergency Session to discuss the fate of Ukraines Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power plant. Rescue teams are searching for hundreds of people a day after an Earthquake Hit southwest china. And at least two people are believed dead as a huge wildfire rages through parts of