If you were living off £73 per week you'd probably think £22 for energy was just a tad exorbitant.

Then if you took into consideration the billions that pour into private and some foreign companies such as SSE/EDF you might also reconsider your stance.

So is it the energy price that's the problem or the benefit payments? How much was power back in the day?

Why can't they both be a problem?

No idea how much energy cost back in the day as my parents took care of that ****, what I do know is you are lucky that you can get by with spending £22pw and be happy with that. I spend at least double what you do on energy and I think it's still a ****ing scandal that private companies make vast profits without giving much/nothing back in return.

French government own about 85% of EDF. EDF make billions from the UK market. I mean wtf else needs said about how wrong this is????

Another legacy of that oul whore Maggie.

I'm obviously not the greatest political mind so I have a few simple questions....Seems to me that SNP will agitate from now until they achieve their goal of independence....where will that leave that party that was in charge of dismantling the union? Unelectable forever?

Also when Scotland goes the rest falls to pieces?

I'm lucky? What makes me 'lucky'?

I see you've mastered the art of saying nothing.

Well done you.

Well you appear to be the expert at that.

The timeline of Scotland leaving is measured in decades. Its too irrelevant to even discuss it.

If the snp doesn't wake up to this fact they will marginalise themselves to irrelevance in Britain.

Do they care? It seems that a lack of political influence would play into their rhetoric for why Scotland should be independent.

But they won't get to be independent regardless.

If they want to achieve anything for Scotland they should care.

Define "vast" in this sense.

The UK's energy bills are some of the lowest in Europe FWIW. Not that this really counts for much, because what your energy costs and what you pay in your bill are different things, given the mass of subsidies, capacity payments etc. that exist.

The simple fact is that this country has got far too used to living beyond its means. We need to stop doing this, which will inevitably result in a lower standard of living.

The problem of living beyond its means would not be so bad if not for:

You realise that is a US only graph where healthcare / insurance costs will be a major factor?

Don't see it indicates anything wrt the UK.

I suspect that graph holds true if you map it back to the industrial revolution, it's the start of an argument but it's not an argument.

Eh, no it wont.

At the start of IR and for long periods yea there is a gap, but just before the war and then after it there is convergence in developed countries between wages and productivity.

You can either have consumerism with wages that are in line with productivity,

Or

You can have consumerism with high debt and wages not in line with productivity. Which is what we have now.

It should be obvious why you cant have consumerism just with relatively low wages and no debt.

The whole reason mass consumerism took off in 50s was because for the first time, there was full employment and relatively high wages in relation to productivity. (Due to the full employment, you had to pay workers equitably, because they were hard to find)

If you pay workers more its not a problem if they are spending those wages on the output of your factory.

Due to globalisation we have had a race to the bottom, where the workers in factories cant hope to afford the things they are making, and in developed countries consumers have to take on more and more debt to buy those products because they have had their wages bargained down by the low wages of off shore workers.

We have seen wages rising in developing countries, much of this increase is funded by the increased debt load of consumers in the "West."

Meanwhile capital owners make out like bandits.

£1.5bn pre tax profit for just one of the companies (sse), isn't that a vast amount?

Their profit margins always rise and they won't ever pass on the true savings they make to the consumer when gas is cheaper.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-31040466

Energy more expensive over here btw, had huge increases over last 3 years with one jump alone costing us an extra 18% on electricity.

Liz Kendall now up to 3/1 odds and tied with Yvette for leader.

No, I don't think it is. The passing on prices thing is virtually impossible to prove or disprove without knowing and understanding how they are hedged. I have no idea what it is like in Ireland but over here nobody needs to be paying too much for their energy. You can switch in ten minutes.

All the main energy companies are under massive pressure right now so you should be pleased.

Amazing. What a choice the people have in a rigged market where the ceo pricks in pinstripe sit around massive ebony tables deciding how much each of their companies will charge.

Honestly, the level of absolute myopia here is astounding.

Not really man...they've kinda got a different approach at the minute in that they accept the people voted no and have no grounds to call for another referendum unless, they say, there are significant changes to the current situation. That said, this Tory gov might well bring about the kinds of changes that the SNP could argue were significant enough to warrant another vote.

With the 56 in Westminster, the remit is to represent their constituencies well and get the best deal for Scotland. Labour haven't given a flying **** about either of those things and have had their last chance for at least a while.

It's worth pointing out that the SNP, contrary to informal parliamentary protocol, will vote on English only matters if there are 'Barnett consequentials' at stake, or if they are voting in alliance with other progressively minded MPs across the UK.

I think if the Tories oversaw the break up of the Union, most of the rest of the people wouldn't give a **** and they'd get in again regardless. It seems to me you could easily find a majority in England who would accept English independence. You'd just have to feed them a bellyful of the 'subsidising the jocks' rhetoric and they'd be scurrying off to the polls to get rid of us.

hear hear

In other news, I love the upheaval among the loyalists caused by the election of 56 SNP MPs.

Hilarity is here.

Of course none of those pricks care about the fundamentals of democracy, one of which should be transparency in public affairs. More selfies from the Chamber please. Time to get rid of the 'mystique' these Tory ****s hold on to so preciously, and open up everything for debate. This country's political system needs a right kick up the arse, and maybe now something like that might happen.

I agree about the changing process. I finally got around to changing last year to a company out with the 'big six' and ended up with a reduction of around 30%. Despite my concerns the switching process was pain free.

Yes, that's exactly how it works. Really.

Go to one of the switching sites - most of the best deals are being offered by smaller independents.