Wealthy Australians are ordering electric cars and buying solar panels, but poor people are locked out of the benefits, a new study has found.
A joint survey by the Melbourne Institute and Roy Morgan showed that roughly 29 per cent of Australians have installed or are considering installing solar panels on their homes to lower their future energy costs.
The survey of 1000 people in December also found that 32 per cent of young adults, or people who earn below $50,000, could not afford to heat or cool their homes to a comfortable level, while 35 per cent of poor Australians had skipped meals to afford bills.Kushneel Prakash from the Melbourne Institute, who wrote the report, said this demonstrated a vicious cycle in energy affordability.
Australian Energy Regulator chairwoman Clare Savage said there had been a 12 per cent increase in people struggling to pay their power bills, and put retailers on notice to support customers. “[These numbers show] retailers aren’t reaching out earlier and saying, ‘Hey, we noticed you missed a couple of bills, what support do you need? How can we help you?’ That’s something that we would like to ideally see,” she said.Ms Savage warned that the AER was prepared to use its powers against retailers, citing the regulator’s recent $17 million penalty against Origin Energy for failing to implement its hardship policies.
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