Since the so-called Iberian exception began to be applied in the middle of this month, which allows limiting the price of gas in Spain and Portugal so as not to transfer it directly to the electricity bill, the large electricity companies have reduced their extraordinary profits by 250 million euros . The figure was made public this Thursday by the Third Vice President of the Government and Minister for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, Teresa Ribera, who, during an appearance before the Plenary Session of Congress, considered that this mechanism “has been effective in at least reducing the wholesale price”, reduce those benefits of large companies, “protect consumers” and serve as a “practical example for the rest of Europe” in the face of new initiatives.
Spain and Portugal propose to limit the price of gas to 30 euros to make electricity cheaper
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Ribera explained that in the first fortnight of June the wholesale price in Spain remained in line with other European countries, but he stressed that “as of June 15, everything changes” coinciding with the application of the Iberian exception. “We have gone from having similar prices to having lower prices,” she pointed out, quantifying that drop compared to other countries at between 45% and 55%. “These are very positive results”, she has settled.
In addition, he explained that for the fourth quarter of the year, experts quantify that Spain will pay an average of 149 euros per megawatt hour compared to 343 in Germany or 723 in France. “These price estimates confirm analysts’ confidence in the proper functioning of the Iberian mechanism”, he added.
However, the vice president has warned of an “extraordinary, complex and worrying context in the short term”, due to the risk that Russia will cut off gas supplies to the countries of the European Union “from one day to the next”. In this context, she has valued that Spain has “a government that prioritizes solidarity”. The country, she has said, “cannot neglect its domestic response” to the Russian threat, for which she has raised the need to implement measures to reduce energy dependence “which may be decisive in the coming fall.”
United We can demand more measures
Ribera has proposed “promoting supplier rediversification measures”, promoting renewables and “prioritizing” energy savings in the face of the “aggressive strategy by Russia, described by many as energy blackmail”. For her, however, a “united response” at European level is “fundamental”. “The EU principles and values are at stake”, she said, before remarking that “the crisis has revealed the vulnerability of an energy model based on fossil fuels”.
In addition to highlighting all the anti-crisis measures approved by the Government that, according to Ribera, will allow inflation to be contained at 3.5 points in the coming months, the vice president has called on all the parliamentary groups to “state sense to protect consumers vulnerable, middle classes and productive sectors” supporting the validation of the decree approved last week by the Council of Ministers.
The spokesman for United We Can in the Congress of Deputies, Pablo Echenique, has used his turn to speak in plenary to demand that the Executive immediately impose the tax on the benefits of energy companies to lower the price of electricity as well as unblock the processing of the CO2 Reduction Law that cuts the income of electricity companies.
Echenique has thus asked not to wait until 2023 to apply this extraordinary tax. “While working people and small businesses can’t make ends meet, the oil and electricity oligopoly is getting rich. You have to raise their taxes, you have to make them pay and you have to do it now, ”he said. In addition, the parliamentary spokesman recalled the coalition government agreement where, in section 3.2. It advocates carrying out “the necessary regulatory changes in relation to the operation of the electricity market to put an end to the benefits that fell from the sky”. “In the government agreement, it does not say ”reduce” or ”mitigate” the benefits that fell from heaven. It says “end” with it, he said. “And it is clear that this has not been achieved,” he assured.
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