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Issue 69
21 -3-9 27 FEB Jan 2014
Energy poverty in Spain by Jan Gamm
Jose Navarro
Keeping up with F.A.S.T F.A.S.T have welcomed new President Jose Navarro, saying he “will be a great asset to the Cause.” Read the full story on page 20.
RISING ENERGY prices and falling incomes have resulted in four million consumers falling victim to ‘fuel poverty’, causing more than 2,300 fatalities a year representing an increase of 55% since 2012, according to Kelisto.es. That is more than the number of road accident fatalities. In more than half of the Member States of the European Union consumers are protected from outages during the coldest months and also have reduced rates for ‘at risk’ groups. LITTLE SYMPATHY In some cases, such as Sweden, the social protection system takes over unpaid bills yet in Spain there is little sympathy for consumers facing unaffordable winter fuel bills: in Spain there
is no official definition of ‘fuel poverty’. However, the contributory factors to the high number of deaths as a result of fuel poverty are not difficult to assess. Families with little spare cash who cannot afford life’s necessities such as a healthy diet, medicines, school books and uniforms and who live in poorly insulated and sometimes badly constructed homes offering little defence against the cold, corners have to be cut somewhere and that somewhere is often the gas or electric bill. EAT OR HEAT As more Spanish families face a decision on whether to ‘eat or heat’ it has emerged that cash-poor households must spend well in excess of 10% of their incomes to keep the home fires burning while suppliers continue to generate huge profit margins.
See page 62