Burnham suggests £108-a-year gas standing charges could be removed
The Mirror reported that during Prime Minister's Questions on 21 October Andy Burnham suggested the £108-a-year standing charges on gas bills could be removed. The paper said he vowed to do more to bring down bills. The Financial Times reported that Mr Burnham plans to cut standing charges from household gas bills. The FT quoted experts who said providers would probably recover the loss of the daily fixed fee via the unit rate. The Mirror presented £108 as the annual cost of the gas standing charge. Neither report gave a start date. Neither described legislation or a regulator decision.
A standing charge is a fixed daily fee paid whether or not any gas is used. Removing it lowers the fixed part of the bill but, as the experts quoted by the FT note, suppliers must still cover their costs somewhere.
For a typical household the £108 headline is the fixed element, but the FT’s experts expect some of it to return in the price per unit, so the net saving is uncertain. Higher users would feel any unit-rate rise more.
The Mirror presents the remark as a pledge to do more on bills, with the £108 saving as the headline benefit for households. On that reading, scrapping a fee that applies to everyone is direct help.
The FT’s experts argue the cost would probably move into the unit rate. On that view, people who use little gas lose the benefit of a low fixed fee and the overall saving is smaller than £108.
Confirmed: Mr Burnham raised it at Prime Minister's Questions and the FT reports a plan. Not confirmed: when, how and who pays. Watch for a Treasury or regulator statement on the mechanism.
DailyDrop U.K. edition No. 18 · Morning · THU., OCT. 22, 2026