The UK Government has shown a "lack of respect" to Welsh Government, according to a Welsh minister.
Social justice minister Jane Hutt said she had written to two different UK Government ministers asking for help to deal with the cost of living crisis but neither had replied.
Speaking in the weekly press conference on Tuesday, February 1, said she had written to Business, energy and industrial relations Kwasi Kwarteng and pensions minister Theresa Coffey.
The letter to Mr Kwarteng was sent on January 11 jointly between Ms Hutt and climate change minister Julie James.
They said they there was a "deep concern" about the impact rising costs are having on Welsh households.
"We are particularly concerned about lower income households at risk of, or already living in, fuel poverty prior to the increase that came into effect in October."
It asked for "serious consideration" to be given to the introduction of a "differentiated domestic energy tariff cap or social energy tariff targeted to better support lower income households".
Secretary of State for Wales, Simon Hart, was also sent the letter.
The letter dated January 14 was sent to Ms Coffey. It asked her to lift benefits rates higher than the 3.1% planned.
The letter said: "A report by the Institute of Financial Studies published on the 12 January noted “in April, welfare benefit payments including jobseekers' allowance and disability benefits are due to rise by 3.1% - in line with the inflation rate recorded last September.” However, we know the cost of living has surged since then and the consumer price rise measure is expected to hit 6% by the spring, largely thanks to soaring energy bills.
"I therefore call upon you to uprate welfare benefit payments this April by 6%. The Institute of Financial Studies calculate this would cost an extra £3bn, but it would save our lowest income households from facing a £290 real terms year-on-year fall in benefit income, helping to slightly ease the cost of crisis living they are facing."
In the weekly press conference, she repeatedly said the UK Government had to step up to "make a real difference" in terms of energy prices".
"What are they doing now? They are not responding to our call to reduce the tariff. Not only have we written to the secretary of state for business, energy and industrial relations but I've written to the secretary of state for work and pensions to say she must cut the lift to benefit rates from April.
"With inflation running at the levels it is, they're only going to be uprated by 3.1%, inflation running up to 6%, I've asked her to raise it to 6%, no response at all. No response from either secretary of state. We are asking them to recognise this is a cost of living crisis, this should be at the forefront of their agenda."
She announced today that people in Wales can apply for a £200 one-off payment to help with bills, saying up to 350,000 people would be eligible for the newly double payment.
"I'm very encouraged by the uptake so far, I think we've had 40% uptake, 106,000 payments made already and we're extending this to the end of February," she said.
The scheme is open to:
The scheme is open to households where one person is in receipt of certain welfare benefits.
- Applications are being processed through local councils.
- If you’ve already made an application or had a £100 payment, you don’t need to do anything else – your local council will send you the additional £100 payment before the end of April.
- Councils have contacted households which they believe are eligible for the payment.
- You can submit an application via your local council’s website by February 28
Both the DWP and BEIS have been contacted for comment and both responded responded saying the letter will be responded to in "due course".
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