After the price caps for electricity and gas are scheduled to expire at the end of the year, households will have to expect comparatively small additional costs. This is what calculations from tariff comparison portals have shown.
Calculated per year, a model household with a consumption of 20,000 kilowatt hours will receive 26 euros (1.1 percent) more for gas and one euro for electricity, as the Verivox portal has calculated.
Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) had announced that the state gas and electricity price brakes would expire at the end of the year and not at the end of March 2024. However, there is resistance to this from the coalition partner SPD. His party believes energy price brakes are also necessary for 2024, said General Secretary Kevin Kühnert to the “Kölnische Rundschau”. There were similar statements from the SPD parliamentary group.
Scholz: Cushioning the economic consequences of the war
The price controls were introduced in March of this year and also applied retroactively to January and February. They should protect consumers from being overwhelmed by skyrocketing energy prices as a result of Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) said at a state party conference in Schönefeld: “It was right to subsidize the high prices for citizens.” The government will continue to do everything it can to cushion the economic consequences of the war.
Old contracts are often more expensive
However, according to Verivox, the energy market has now recovered. Many suppliers lowered their prices for the new year. Customers with older contracts should now switch to a new tariff if necessary. According to the calculations, anyone who still has a basic supply tariff will have to pay 82 euros more for gas and five euros more for electricity next year if the brakes are relaxed three months earlier.
Finance Minister Lindner announced this on Friday. The background is the budget ruling of the Federal Constitutional Court, which means the government is now missing billions. “It cannot be assumed that we will have an emergency in terms of electricity, gas and economic viability at the beginning of next year,” said Lindner on Deutschlandfunk.
Kühnert: No decision from the coalition
“That may be his opinion – it is not a decision by the coalition,” commented Kühnert Lindner’s announcement. Whether there will still be energy price brakes in 2024 must now be politically negotiated.
The Bundestag actually only decided to apply the brakes by March 31 the day after the Karlsruhe ruling. Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) saw this as a precautionary measure in the event that prices rose again. In view of the foreseeable need for austerity as a result of the budget ruling, this is no longer at the top of the Greens’ priority list. Prices are currently more moderate anyway, it was said at the party conference in Karlsruhe on Saturday.
Criticism from trade unions and the Union
“Letting the price brakes expire before winter will cause additional uncertainty,” criticized Yasmin Fahimi, chairwoman of the German Federation of Trade Unions (DGB). CSU boss Markus Söder made similar comments. He accused the government of lack of planning.
The chief budget officer of the Union faction, Christian Haase (CDU), told the German Press Agency in Berlin on Saturday that the Karlsruhe court had caught the coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP violating the constitution. “This self-inflicted legal violation must now be remedied. The expiry of the energy price cap is unfortunately the unpleasant result of this judgment.”
Meanwhile, the comparison portal Check24 reminded that the VAT on gas and heat will rise again to the full amount in March after two years. This would result in additional expenditure of 224 euros per year for the sample maintenance.
