Victoria

In Victoria, the draft proposal is for prices to fall 6.4 per cent, or $112 a year, for households. Small business bills will decrease 7 per cent, or $266.

Victoria’s prices are not set by the Australia Energy Regulator but rather by the state’s Essential Services Commission, which produces its own default offer.

Queensland

In south-east Queensland on the Energex network, household prices will rise 2.7 per cent, or $53, a year while small business bills will fall 0.3 per cent, or $11.

While this is a draft proposal and the regulator is going away to look at feedback from companies and electricity customers, it’s a reliable guide to what energy bills will cost over the 12 months from July this year.

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Power prices rose sharply over the past two years due to spikes in wholesale power prices – what retailers pay for power before they sell it to their customers – caused by a spate of problems across Australia’s ageing coal-fired power stations and coal mines last year curtailing supply, while the war in Ukraine drove up the cost of additional coal and gas needed to plug shortfalls.

Federal Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen advised the Australian Energy Regulator to prioritise lowering power bills this year. The regulator said in a statement on Tuesday its draft ruling sought to balance the objectives of lowering “unjustifiably high prices” while enabling electricity retailers to earn a sufficient margin to recover their costs, drive market competition and invest in innovations.