- Fuel poverty ‘continues to rise’, October 21, 2009, BBC News: “Up to 4.6 million households in England could be in fuel poverty in 2009, new figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change show. The government has vowed to end fuel poverty in England by 2016. Fuel poverty is defined as those who spend more than 10% of their household income on heating their homes. The projection comes within data that reveals the number fuel-poor households in the UK rose from 3.5 million in 2006 to four million in 2007. The data, based on the latest figures for England and Scotland along with extrapolated estimates for Wales and Northern Ireland, suggest that 16% of all UK households were in fuel poverty in 2007…”
- Households in fuel poverty to hit 4.6m, By Sandra Haurant, October 21, 2009, The Guardian: “The number of households living in fuel poverty in England is likely to reach 4.6 million by the end of the year, figures published by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) showed today. A household is said to be “fuel poor” when more than 10% of its income is spent on fuel to maintain an “adequate level of warmth” – usually 21C in the living area and 18C in other rooms. The latest figures show that 3.25 million households in the UK lived in fuel poverty in 2007, an increase of half a million compared with 2006. In England 2.8 million households were fuel poor in 2007, up from 2.4 million in 2006. The DECC said the jump in fuel poverty was caused by an increase in fuel prices, which continued to soar in 2008…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty