Social affairs reporter

SINGLE-PARENT families, disabled households and black families are bearing the brunt of Britain’s energy debt crisis, according to new analysis of the government’s own household survey.

Research by Ana Castro and Jonathan Bradshaw at the University of York, released on Tuesday, draws on the Family Resources Survey 2024-25, which found 3.9 per cent of households, about 1.1 million in total, had fallen into fuel arrears. 

The rate was 14.3 per cent among single-parent families — more than three times the national average — and 9.5 per cent among black, African, Caribbean and black British households. 

Some 6.6 per cent of families with a disabled member were in arrears, compared with 1.9 per cent where no-one is disabled.

Yorkshire and the Humber and Scotland recorded the highest regional rates at 4.9 per cent, while Northern Ireland had the lowest at 1.0 per cent. 

The survey predates the 13.5 per cent rise in the price cap that took effect on July 1.

Meanwhile, energy regulator Ofgem reported last month that debt owed to energy suppliers had reached a record £4.79 billion, up 5 per cent on the previous quarter. 

More recent polling for the End Fuel Poverty Coalition found nearly a third of the population is now either in debt to their supplier or worried about falling behind.

Coalition co-ordinator Simon Francis said the analysis “lays bare who is paying the price for our broken energy system” and should “remind policy-makers and regulators that this is a can’t-pay crisis, not a won’t-pay one.”

“The long-promised energy debt relief scheme must now be brought forward and funded through energy company windfall profits, not added to consumer bills,” he said. 

“The firms handed billions by this crisis should be first in line to help clear the debt mountain it created.”

Eva Watkinson, from Debt Justice, said the evidence from the government’s own figures “is damning, and demolishes any idea that people in debt are choosing not to pay their energy bills.”

She said: “Ofgem and the government have delayed action long enough. With a new Prime Minister in post, they must get serious. 

“It’s time they deliver on the debt relief scheme promised two years ago, funded by network company windfalls, not by adding more to our bills.”