UK gas prices to soar 35pc

British Gas owner Centrica says it will raise gas and electricity prices for UK households by 35 per cent and 9 per cent respectively, citing rising wholesale gas prices.

The company, the biggest household supplier in the UK with over 16 million customers, said profits at its British Gas Residential unit had fallen 69 per cent in the first half, while wholesale prices for the coming winter are up nearly 90 per cent on the previous year.

Centrica shares rose 1.5 per cent to 314.75 pence, valuing the business at 11.7 billion pounds ($24.36 billion).

"We very much regret that we have had to make this decision at a time when many household budgets are already under pressure," British Gas managing director Phil Bentley said in a statement.

He added that the firm would be contacting all its customers to show how they can save energy to offset the price rises.

The bill hikes will come in with immediate effect.

Centrica is the second of the six major suppliers to the UK market to raise prices in less than a week, after French supplier EDF Energy hiked gas and electricity bills 22 per cent and 17 per cent respectively on Friday.

The other four are expected to follow suit sometime before the winter months.

They are RWE-owned nPower, Iberdrola-owned Scottish Power, E.ON UK, and Scottish and Southern Energy.

The trend of repeated rounds of price hikes by the main suppliers was criticised in a report by British members of Parliament on Monday, which said the market did not operate efficiently and that it was easy for companies to predict what their rivals were going to do.

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