"It would be difficult to categorically rule out more increases with the temperament of the wholesale market," said Craig Lowrey, head of energy market research at independent analysts Energy Information Centre.

"The next increases would be more likely to be six or seven months down the line," he said.

Britain's biggest energy supplier Centrica last week put up bills by a record 22 percent, bringing the price issue to a head after two years of big increases by all of the country's suppliers.

Centrica's move came a day after the European Commission promised a crackdown on anti-competitive behaviour in the wider European gas market which has been slow to open up despite efforts by the Commission to liberalise the markets.

Centrica, which blamed the increase on a 63 percent jump in wholesale gas costs over the last year, said the rise was likely to be the last one this year but it could not give guarantees.

SPOTLIGHT

Wholesale prices have surged to record levels as North Sea output has dropped while most new projects to import gas are in the development stage.

High oil prices and the cost to utilities of cutting greenhouse gas emissions have also helped drive up prices.

Britain produces about 40 percent of its power from gas-fired power stations, so gas and power prices tend to move in tandem.

Surging gas and power prices have put Britain's energy policy under the spotlight. The government has launched an emergency policy review which also aims to tackle the problem of rising greenhouse gas emissions.

But there has been no sign of the government intervening in the fully competitive market that Britain's energy sector has operated in for over a decade.

"High short-term gas prices have caused (politicians) a problem," said Ian Marchant, chief executive of Britain's third-biggest energy supplier Scottish and Southern Energy.

"From the UK perspective the reaction has been remarkably restrained in that (politicians) recognise that global forces are pushing up prices," he told a utilities conference in London.

Marchant pointed out that all the big energy suppliers offered special "fuel poverty" schemes to help vulnerable customers like the elderly cope with soaring prices.

RELIEF IN SIGHT

Niall Trimble of independent gas analysts The Energy Contract Company said bills could start dropping towards the end of next year as new gas supplies start to create a surplus.

"You'll probably see a reduction in bills by the end of 2007 because the (wholesale) market will be oversupplied by then," said Trimble.

He said the UK gas market could see a dramatic turnaround from the current tight supply to a 20 percent surplus in 2007/2008, even without significant imports of liquefied natural gas.