A North Glasgow community has once again protested amid a dispute over prices with their energy supplier.
As the Glasgow Times previously reported, the Wyndford Residents Union has been holding demonstrations against energy company SSE since last April.
That was when the provider increased the scheme's heat and hot water bills by 50%, due to rising global energy costs.
Residents spoke out against the price hike because they felt it was “creating fuel poverty”.
READ MORE: Wyndford residents to buy SSE shares in effort to 'have their voices heard'
Nick Durie, from the Wyndford Residents Union, said: “From our calculations, our community is in 100% fuel poverty.
“The scheme that was brought in, we were promised it would end fuel poverty and clearly, it has done the exact opposite.
“People are very enraged about this and we made that clear to them.
"One person I spoke with pays £37 a month and was asked this week to up it to £79 a month.
"Not everyone pays the same way, we have bills, direct debits, standing orders or key meters, but whatever your usage, standing charges have gone up significantly and the unit cost of the 'energy' in the wastewater has doubled."
SSE provides hot water to the 1800 homes on the estate, which they use for heating.
This water is a byproduct of the company's power plant, which burns gas to generate energy, sold to the National Grid.
Initially introduced in 2011, the scheme aims to alleviate fuel poverty, but residents claim this did not happen.
READ MORE: Wyndford community protests against energy price increase at Glasgow power plant
Despite making headway with talks, the group is still pushing for the reinstatement of their original prices, before the hike in April.
On Tuesday, they gathered in Perth in front of the SSE headquarters to raise awareness of their demands.
The group said they had previously met with SSE executives to ensure they would remain exempt from the Ofgem price cap increase.
SSE told the Glasgow Times that there are different contract structures across its heat networks with a range of developers and housing associations.
At Wyndford specifically, the firm later confirmed that it was never going to increase prices in October in response to the energy price cap rise.
An SSE spokesperson added: “SSE has frozen bills for all its heat networks customers until May 2023. This means our customers will be shielded from the 80% rise UK domestic energy bill payers face from October 1 - as announced by Ofgem last week.
"We would encourage anyone in Wyndford who needs additional help to get in touch with us directly so that we can discuss ways to support them.
“We are also looking at additional measures we can take to support all our heat network customers.”
The Glasgow Times has been raising awareness of energy prices as part of our campaign, Beat The Squeeze.
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