Statement from Belfast WolfeTone/McCracken cumann 32CSM on energy price rises.
Gas supplier Firmus Energy have announced today a 56.3% increase on the price of household gas, effective as of October 3rd, an eye watering increase amidst the ongoing cost of living crisis.
One of the current director’s of this private company is Jennifer ‘Jenny’ Pyper, appointed to the role in November 2021. In a sweeping contrast the year prior Jennifer held the position of interim head of the civil service, a body described as “managing government contracts and providing frontline support to people using public services”, yet is now fuelling and benefitting from this crisis.
What’s even more surprising and worrying though is the position Jennifer Pyper held before her public service role. From 2013 until 2020 she was Chief executive of the Authority For Utility Regulation, a supposedly independent body set up to regulate household utilities such as gas and electricity and who state on their website “promote the short and long term interests of comsumers”.
It’s amazing how this woman who was the face of a body designed to help the public, could become the director of a company now fully engaged in a cost of living attack on the public.
Jennifer Pyper’s involvement in these private and public sectors exposes the level of infiltration and power that big energy companies have over supposed publicly accountable bodies. She is just one of the countless individuals manipulating the public sector to benefit these multi national companies and private investors.
Firmus aren’t alone in this latest price hike, many energy companies have already stated that come October their prices will rise a significant amount, companies such as SSE Airtricity who will increase their electricity prices by 38.5% and gas tariffs by 28.4%, squeezing the absolute maximum out of consumers, mostly the working class who are already on their knees due to the extortionate costs of living necessities. This while the cost of wholesale gas fell by more than 20% last week.
As we approach the winter months this attack on the working class will only get worse unless we as members of the public living on the frontline of this crisis band together in a unified force and demand in whichever way necessary, an end to this inhumane saga. Corporate greed needs to end now.
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