• Hundreds of people attended protests against the Big Six energy companies on the day the ONS released figures showing 31,000 ‘excess winter deaths’ in winter 2012-2013, a 29% increase on last year. [1] The protests have now come to an end.
• Protests were organised by anti-austerity groups including Fuel Poverty Action, UK Uncut, Disabled People Against Cuts, and the Greater London Pensioners Association.
• London protesters targeted Npower’s supply and trading HQ at 60 Threadneedle Street, blocking the road outside the offices. Further protests took place today in Oxford, Lewes, and Bristol Acting together under the banner of ‘Bring down the Big Six – Fuel Poverty Kills!’
In London, hundreds of protesters marched on Npower, blocking the road outside their offices, bringing traffic in the City to a standstill. Protesters delivered a coffin filled with energy bills to Npower and held a ‘speak-out’ where those hardest hit by fuel poverty spoke of their experiences.
The protests marked the release of new figures on last winter’s ‘excess winter deaths’. There were 31,000 excess winter deaths in 2012-2013, a 29% increase on the previous winter. Protests also happened in Oxford – who targeted British Gas at their new Oxford HQ – Lewes and Bristol. [2]
Clare Welton of Fuel Poverty Action said: ‘The Big Six are to blame for these tragic and unjust winter deaths: their profiteering and their addiction to expensive and dirty forms of energy like oil and gas have pushed our bills up to fatal highs. People are protesting to demand the alternatives to the Big Six’s killer cartel – a combination of publicly owned and community controlled renewable energy, alongside mass insulation, would bring down the bills.’
Susan Jarrett of UK Uncut said: ‘The fact that people are dying of fuel poverty as Npower and other energy companies rake in the money and avoid tax is a scandal. This Government is not only unnecessarily cutting our services in the name of austerity but are allowing these energy companies to literally get away with murder which is why we are fighting back today.’
