HIT by rises in electricity and gas bills running at six times the annual inflation rate? Then blame the Tory Party's privatisations of the 1980s and New Labour's deregulation of the energy market in the 1990s.

As a result just six firms, five of them partly or wholly foreign-owned, now control 98% of the British gas market.

The Big Six are Npower - owned by German-based multinational RWE Group. E.On - a German firm. EDF - which stands for Electricite de France but since May last year has been owned by the Spanish-based Iberdrola. Scottish Power - is about as Scottish as sangria, also being owned by Iberdrola. British Gas - its 'Britishness' is somewhat diluted by the large stake in it held by Petronas of Malaysia. Scottish & Southern - the only one in British hands.

The six firms meet as the 'Energy Retail Association' of which they are the only members, so it's no surprise that they all announce almost identical price rises within a few weeks of each other. The latest profit figures from the Big Six reveal that in the first six months of last year they raked up a cool £2 billion in profits which is why the average household energy bill will exceed £1000 this year.

British householders are a captive market so the energy companies can raise prices exactly as they like because they can monopolise the market through a cosy price-fixing cartel. Products like gas and electricity, which are expensive to produce and distribute and really only economic to do so on a very large scale, are natural monopolies and as such best run for public benefit, rather than profit, by the State.

In the 1980s the Tories sold off these natural monopolies at artificially low valuations so shares in them would be cheap to attract buyers.

Then New Labour 'deregulated' the privatised public utilities leaving the industries dominated by a cartel of a few giant foreign-owned companies ripping off the public to swell their profits which are promptly exported overseas.

The only way out of this mess is to take natural monopolies like power, fuel, water, and the railways back into public ownership. The British National Party is pledged to ensure that British gas and electricity is delivered to British homes by British people working for a State owned concern at prices British families and pensioners can afford.