Black Sheep Brewery boss: energy support is 'brutal'

11-Jan-2023 - Last updated on 11-Jan-2023 at 20:03 GMT

Brutal: Black Sheep Brewery chief executive Charlene Lyons (pictured) said everyone will be worse off under the new energy support scheme

The Government’s new energy support package is “brutal”, according to Black Sheep Brewery chief executive Charlene Lyons.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt earlier this week announced the Energy Bill Relief Scheme would be replaced with the Energy Bill Discount Scheme from Saturday 1 April, reducing the support businesses receive by 70%.

Lyons said: “It's fairly brutal in comparison to what we've been receiving.

“As a high impact energy business, we receive a higher rate of relief, but then the pubs don't.

“It's a really tough pill to swallow because you've got the brewery that loosely benefits, but there's no point having a brewery firing on all cylinders if you haven't got the capacity to sell beer because the pubs can't afford to open because they can't afford their energy bill.

Significantly worse off

“The fundamental package across the board is not great. We're all going to be significantly worse off.”

Under the new scheme businesses paying higher energy prices will receive a capped discount on wholesale gas prices until March 2024 applied to 70% of energy volumes.

This means the threshold of support for energy intensive businesses, such as breweries, will be £99/MWh for gas and £185/MWh for electricity, subject to a “maximum discount” of £40/MWh for gas and £89.1/MWh for electricity.

While non-energy intensive firms, such as pubs, will see a unit discount of up to £6.97/MWh on their gas bill and a discount of up to £19.61/Mwh on their electricity bills, subject to a wholesale price threshold of £107/MWh for gas and £302/MWh for electricity.

Businesses do not need to apply for the discount, though non-energy intensive firms paying costs below these levels will not receive support.

Growth strategies

Lyons continued that on a more “positive” note, the certainty provided by the Energy Bill Discount Scheme allowed businesses to “plan accordingly”.

However, the chief executive stated the Government should have extended support at its current level for at least another 12 months and needed to take a more “collaborative approach”.

Moreover, Lyons estimated if pubs adjusted prices to keep up with potential increases a pint would cost more than £10.

She added: “All of this has a massive impact on ours and other people's growth strategies.

“We're trying to grow the economy but the reality is these types of packages make it very difficult to do that.”