Don’t Pay UK strike called off after failing to sign enough people
Energy Campaign Group Don't Pay UK has had to call off its planned bill strike today (1 October) after not reaching the target number of pledges.
The energy campaign group had hoped for one million pledges to be reached by the time of the protest, but as of now the number sits at less than a fifth of that at just over 192,000 people.
The plan was for everyone to cancel their energy bill direct debits on 1 October, in response to the price cap increasing.
When the non-payment campaign group launched in June, households were facing energy bills as much as £3,500 a year from today (1 October), and over £5,000 from January 2022.
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However, newly-installed Prime Minister Liz Truss announced a household will now be expected to spend around £2,500 on average on energy a year for the next two years.
A Don't Pay UK spokesperson told LADbible: "We won’t call the strike until we hit 1 million pledges and we’ve been clear from the beginning about this. The threat of almost 200,000 of us saying we won’t pay has already forced the government to step in and reduce the catastrophic 80% energy price rise we faced today. But we should be clear: this crisis is far from over.
"More than 7 million households will be in fuel poverty after prices rise again. We’ll be paying 96% more to heat our homes this winter than the last while energy companies make £170 billion in excess profits. And the government has chosen to keep making the rich even wealthier instead of supporting working class people.
"We’ll keep building the strike until the 1 million threshold – but local groups have also been building the structures we need in our local communities to protect ourselves and each other from the cold this winter."
It was also confirmed to LADbible that Don't Pay groups will be out on the streets across the country today (1 October) to protest and burn their bills.
Much of the campaign material on the Don't Pay UK website still prominently promotes 1 October being a significant day when you refuse to pay your energy bills in protest.
However, there was no guarantee that all the people who had initially signed up to the campaign would take part in the dodging of their energy bills on 1 October.
When Don't Pay UK was founded in June, they spoke on finding a permanent solution to the energy crisis.
On their website, they said: "The previous price cap was already unaffordable for many, for example, so we need to transform the energy sector to permanently make energy affordable."
"To address this, a process within the Don't Pay movement called ‘Fair price for power’ will begin this autumn, during which the movement will decide together in local groups what a fair price to pay for our energy is and how we can achieve and enforce that price by transforming the energy sector."
Callum Jones