Energy Minister Chris Bowen has called on energy retailers to justify their recent price increases. Under the Australian Energy Regulator's default market offer for 2026-27, households across most of the country were expecting reductions of up to 10%. However, some companies have found ways to work around these expectations.
The minister explained that while companies must apply the default market offer to their default products, they are not required to extend these reductions to all their market offers. Some retailers have responded by raising fixed supply costs while simultaneously reducing per-kilowatt hour charges. Bowen has referred these practices to the ACCC to investigate whether they violate prohibited misconduct provisions in energy market laws, which require companies to pass on sustained cost reductions to consumers.
Sources: theguardian.com / australianenergyregulator.gov.au
The words in bold are from the article.
| 1. justify | a. ongoing |
| 2. expecting | b. explain |
| 3. work around | c. anticipating |
| 4. apply | d. use |
| 5. extend | e. at the same time |
| 6. retailers | f. circumvent |
| 7. simultaneously | g. regulations |
| 8. investigate | h. companies |
| 9. provisions | i. apply |
| 10. sustained | j. look into |
1.b 2.c 3.f 4.d 5.i 6.h 7.e 8.j 9.g 10.a