75,000 support Don’t Pay UK campaign urging households to stop using energy payments

thousands of the ‘energy bill martyrs’, including a Church of England chaplain, say they will halt payments this winter as forecasts showed bills could rise to £4,700 a year.

Up to 75,000 have pledged support to Don’t Pay UK, a civil disobedience campaign urging people to cancel direct debits on utility bills.

At the same time, a poll shows mounting anger at what some see as politicians’ failure to address the crisis facing millions of households struggling to feed their families, keep the lights on and keep warm.

Public First polls showed most Britons expected a bill or tax boycott, while a third said there was a risk of public protests following the tax riots of the early 1990s.

Over the weekend, forecasts emerged that indicated annual bills could rise by 270 percent in a year – driven by the Russian invasion of Ukraine – taking them to £4,700 from April.

Don’t Pay UK hopes to reach a million members by October if the government fails to support households facing financial ruin while the revenues of oil and gas giants soar.

If the protest continues, the so-called energy bill martyrs risk being taken to court, facing additional charges, a black mark on their creditworthiness and forced to have prepayment meters installed on their properties.

Signatories include Reverend Mo Budd, 35, a Church of England chaplain from south London, who said: ‘Members of the Church of England are traditionally not known for their direct approach to political or social crises. However, the scale of the cost of living crisis calls for a different response.”

She told The Sunday Times: ‘None of us want to break the law or get in trouble with our energy suppliers. But if we don’t act, vast numbers of people will have no choice but to default on their utility bills because they just can’t afford them.

“As a believer, it is my duty to show solidarity with the most vulnerable in my community.”

Public First found that 54 percent believed households would refuse to pay bills or taxes, while 33 percent expected disorder in the streets.

A majority – 61 percent – believed more households were likely to be shut down, and a large proportion expected an increase in homelessness, begging and crime.

Worryingly for the government, about 43 percent think it is not taking the cost of living crisis seriously, and 55 percent say ministers could do more to help. James Frayne, founder of Public First, said: “The fear of rising costs is growing day by day, and so is the anger at politicians failing to do something about it. If politicians don’t come up with something really big very soon, they lose all public support and they never get it back.’

The official energy tariff cap set by regulator Ofgem brought typical annual bills to £1,277 in the first three months of this year. This rose to £1,971 on April 1, and new analysis suggests it could rise to £3,687 from October 1.

The figures come from energy consultancy Auxilione, which is forecasting an increase to £4,400 in January and £4,700 in April. It read, “Over the past 24 hours, we’ve been comparing our values ​​to other analysts who seem to be in the same position as us — disbelief.”

Ofgem said such predictions should be treated with “extreme caution.”

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said the Don’t Pay UK protest was “irresponsible” and it was up to energy companies to crack down on customers who refused to pay their bills.

It comes as activists threaten to block parliament for weeks in protest against plans to expand North Sea oil production. The Just Stop Oil group claims the disruption from October 1 could be Britain’s biggest civil disobedience campaign ever.

A government spokesman said: ‘We will not bow to the will of activists who naively want to extinguish oil and gas from the North Sea. That would endanger energy security and only increase foreign imports without reducing demand.’