Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s package of measures to tackle energy bill rises of 54% are untargeted, and do nothing to protect the economy and the climate from future shocks, Greenpeace has said.

Following an announcement from the energy regulator Ofgem that energy bills will soar by 54%, or £693, the Chancellor revealed:

An untargeted £200 temporary discount on bills, which applies to all households and will eventually be repaid at a later date when energy prices fall. Average bills will still rise nearly £500 per year.
A broadly applied £150 council tax cut for most households in bands A to D, or 80% of homes in England.
Increasing the Warm Homes Discount and expanding the scheme to reach more people.
Despite widespread support for a windfall tax on oil and gas companies who’ve seen profits soar off the back of high gas prices, Sunak made no reference as to how the measures would be funded and explicitly ruled out a windfall tax. The expansion of the warm homes discount alone could reportedly cost £2.5bn, which the Treasury would not recover.

It comes just hours after oil giant Shell reported its annual profits quadrupled last year to more than £14bn. Labour, the Liberal Democrats, a broad range of charities and three quarters of Conservative voters are among those who support a windfall tax.

Greenpeace UK’s head of climate Kate Blagojevic said: “These measures are devastatingly scant for the poorest households, and aren’t sufficiently targeted to those who need them the most.

“Not only has Sunak rejected widespread calls for a windfall tax on oil and gas companies whose profits have quadrupled, but – against all expert advice – he’s said he actually wants more investment in North Sea oil and gas.

“Both Sunak and Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng admit that our reliance on fossil gas has got us into this mess, yet Sunak has absolutely no vision to shift the North Sea industry to cleaner, cheaper renewable power.

“We need to see real support for home insulation, a heat pump roll-out and training programmes for fossil fuel workers to create hundreds of thousands of new jobs, drive down energy bills, boost our economy and fight climate change.”

Greenpeace UK has calculated that a windfall tax on the estimated profits of fossil fuel companies could raise £4bn in revenues. This money would be enough to cover a £500 one-off payment to the six millions households expected to be in fuel poverty by April while also leaving a further £1bn to insulate homes and cut future bills.

The UK has one of the most favourable tax regimes in the world for offshore oil and gas drilling. The £4bn could be raised by simply increasing the tax level on fossil fuel production from 40 to 70%, which would still be lower than that of Norway, Mexico or India.