Energy Minister faces questions on electricity bills in parliament

In a series of replies to parliamentary questions, Energy Minister Joe Mizzi addressed the issue of allegedly higher utility bills, as a result of them being calculated every two months.

When asked by Nationalist MP David Agius, Mizzi said that the number of utility bills per client has actually decreased since 2012.

In 2012, the average number of bills per client stood at 6.1, while the average number in 2017 was 5.7 per client, he said. “This means that the allegation by the Opposition that ARMS is releasing more bills than before is a lie.”

Earlier this month, the issue was raised by economist Marie Briguglio on her Facebook page, where she wrote that the two-month billing system could lead to overcharging.

The argument was that utility bills being calculated once every two months as opposed to yearly or half-yearly would lead to people missing out on tariff brackets from one period to another.

In his response to parliamentary questions on Monday, the minister explained that the number receiving bills which did not go over the lowest level of tariffs – 2,000 units per year – increased by 4.3% in 2017 when compared to the same figure in 2012.

This means that there are more clients benefitting from the lowest tariffs currently than there were in 2012, and also that clients were consuming less electricity, the minister said.

“The government will continue to work to ensure that Maltese families continue to benefit from one of the lowest tariffs of electricity in Europe, as they did in 2014, and as was confirmed numerous times by Eurostat,” Mizzi said.

Mizzi noted that the number of clients who had their electricity cut due to unsettled bills has also decreased in the past years, tabling the following figures:

2015 - 68%

2016 - 58%

2017 - 24%

2018 - 20%

Mizzi once again stressed that ARMS “did not change anything” since 2013, and that the decision to issue residential bills every two months was made in 2012.

The minister also revealed that the number of people who have their electricity read automatically – therefore receive their bill every two months – amounted to 134,508, while manual readings amounted to 24,855.