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Friday, 19.04.2024, 16:10
Latvian EcoMin set to compensate poor for growing electricity costs
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The Latvian Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (SPRK) in early May approved inclusion of a fixed component or the connection charge in the electricity distribution tariff of Sadales Tikls, the electric power distribution subsidiary of the state-owned electricity utility Latvenergo. The company said it wanted customers to pay the connection charge because over 100,000 power connections in Latvia consumed little and at times no electricity at all but Sadales Tikls still incurred costs for maintenance of the relevant infrastructure.
For households with average electricity consumption, the new tariff will not be higher than the current tariff but electricity bills will increase for households spending little or no electricity at all.
Therefore the Economics Ministry proposed amendments to the Law on the Electricity Market providing for compensations to the underprivileged social groups also for the charges related to the electric power distribution services.
The parliament passed the amendments in the final reading on May 19, 2016, but they have not yet been promulgated. In the meantime, the Cabinet of Ministers is drafting the related regulations. When the legislative amendments are promulgated and the regulations have been finalized in cooperation with the stakeholders, the regulations will be put before the ministers for approval.
As reported, the Latvian Federation of Pensioners has sent a letter to Prime Minister Maris Kucinskis (Greens/Farmers) with a request to create a mechanism to compensate low-income pensioners for the rising cost of electricity.
The federation said that low-income pensioners trying to economize on electricity costs would suffer because the connection charge would increase their electricity bills, further reducing the amounts they could spend from their meagre pensions on food and medicines.
Socially sensitive issues must be addressed in a socially responsible manner, and discrimination against the poorest social groups in inadmissible, the federation said, urging the prime minister to come up with a compensatory mechanism to compensate low-income pensioners for the rising cost of electricity.
Kucinskis replied that the Cabinet regulations were being drafted which would deal with the pensioners’ concerns about higher electricity costs.
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