propertytalk Live! - Fuel poverty depends on location

propertytalk Live! - Fuel poverty depends on location

Stark differences in fuel poverty levels across the UK have been revealed in research by comparison and switching service uSwitch.com, with Wales and the east of England hit hardest of all.

Almost a third of households in Wales (32%) and the east of England (31%) are fuel poor while London was found to have the lowest level of fuel poverty in the UK with just 16% of households affected.

However, with huge anomalies in how wealth is distributed across the capital, some parts of London could be experiencing far higher levels of fuel poverty than the findings suggest.

As well as being the fuel poor capital of the UK, Wales is also the victim of a postcode lottery on energy prices that sees local households paying more for their energy than most other parts of the UK.

The research also doesn't take into account the most recent round of energy price hikes, which added £161 or 14% onto household energy bills and pushed an estimated 569,000 more households into fuel poverty. In total, household energy bills have rocketed by £633 or 96% in just over five years and an estimated 6.9 million or 27% of households are now fuel poor.