Are UK household energy bills the ‘highest in Europe’?

In recent days both the Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage have made claims about how energy costs in the UK compare to other countries.

On 1 September, in his first Commons statement since becoming PM, Mr Burnham claimed that UK “household energy bills are the highest in Europe”.

And on 3 September, on the first day of the Reform UK conference, Mr Farage said on Facebook that British people and businesses “face the highest energy costs in the Western world”.

We’ve not found evidence to fully support either claim in relation to “energy bills” or “energy costs” as a whole, however.

An energy expert told us they were not aware of any directly comparable data for average household bills across Europe, and Ofgem, the energy regulator, also said it doesn’t publish international energy bill comparisons.

The government does publish figures comparing the unit price of electricity and gas in different countries. These show that UK’s domestic electricity unit prices are among the highest in Europe and in 2024 the UK’s industrial electricity unit prices were the highest among International Energy Agency member countries for whom figures were available. But a number of other countries have higher domestic and industrial gas prices.

We’ve asked Number 10 and the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero what Mr Burnham’s claim was based on, and we’ve also contacted Reform UK about Mr Farage’s claim, but we’ve not had any response—we’ll update this fact check if we hear back.

Highest household bills in Europe?

The government publishes figures comparing UK electricity and gas prices with those in most of the 32 members of the International Energy Agency (IEA), as well as EU member states.

These figures suggest that UK domestic electricity unit prices are among the highest in Europe but its domestic gas prices are generally lower than the median.

It’s important to note though that these figures do not compare the average household energy bills in these countries, which are affected by other factors, including the amount of energy consumed by households in different countries.

We’ve not found any reliable figures comparing average household bills in Europe, and Dr Filip Mandys, research fellow at the Bartlett School of Environment, Energy and Resources at University College London, told us he was not aware of any such data either.

We’ve instead looked here at how price data compares. Dr Mandys told us: “The existing evidence suggests high electricity prices specifically, but not a broader conclusion about total household energy bills.”

The latest available data published by the government is for 2025, and uses Eurostat data to compare the UK with EU member states, broken down by small, medium and large consumers. It does not show the UK as having the highest average annual domestic electricity or gas unit prices in any of these categories. For medium consumers, the UK’s domestic electricity prices including taxes were higher than in all but three EU states (Belgium, Germany and Ireland), while gas prices were below the median.

The government also publishes separate data comparing UK prices with IEA members—the most recent figures refer to 2024. This shows the average annual price of electricity for domestic consumers in the UK excluding taxes was 29p per kilowatt-hour (kWh)—the highest among the 20 European IEA members for which comparable figures are available. Including taxes, the average annual price in the UK was 30.45p per kWh—the second highest, behind Germany.

However gas prices again tell a different story. In 2024 the average annual price of gas for domestic consumers in the UK excluding taxes was 7.09p per kWh, and 7.44p including taxes—below the median price across European IEA members for which figures are available.

All of these figures look at the price per kWh of electricity and gas. As noted earlier, the actual average household bill in each country will also be affected by the average amount of energy used.

Highest energy costs in the Western world?

It’s not entirely clear what Mr Farage was referring to when he talked about British people and businesses facing the highest “energy costs” in the “Western world”, but we’ve not found data suggesting UK energy prices as a whole are highest.

It is true that in 2024 the UK had the highest average industrial electricity price per kWh, both excluding and including taxes, of all IEA countries for which figures are available.

The average industrial gas price in the UK meanwhile was the third highest (behind Slovakia and Switzerland) excluding taxes, and around the middle of the pack including taxes.

Figures comparing the UK with only EU countries for 2025 show that the UK generally had the highest average non-domestic electricity prices both excluding and including taxes, but non-domestic gas prices were lower than the median.

We wrote about a similar claim last year when then-shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho MP said that the UK’s electricity was the “most expensive in the world”.

And if Mr Farage was intending to refer to domestic energy prices when he talked about the costs faced by “British people”, as noted above UK domestic electricity prices are amongst the highest compared to IEA and EU member states, which covers much of the “Western world”, but its domestic gas prices are not.