Conservative manifesto gives ‘massive opportunity’ to suppliers

Wording opens up space for negotiation on price cap, says chief executive

The wording around commitments to interventions in the energy retail market in the Conservative party manifesto offer a “massive opportunity” to energy suppliers, according to one chief executive.

Greg Jackson, the boss of Octopus Energy, told Utility Week: “It’s so important that the industry comes up with a good solution for the government.

“For those that want more transparency and competition in the market, this is a massive opportunity.”

Since the publication of the Conservative manifesto, there has been widespread commentary in the national and industry press, identifying an apparent softening of the Tory position on market capping.

In the weeks running up to the document’s release, the prime minister and other senior Conservative figures had suggested that an absolute cap would be applied across the board, affecting millions of customers and delivering a controversial £100 saving per household.

Such promises were absent from the official party policy document however. This simply promised to “introduce a safeguard tariff cap that will extend the price protection currently in place for some vulnerable customers to more customers on the poorest value tariffs”.

Utility Week understands that the ambiguous wording of the price cap pledge reflects continuing tensions within the government over how to proceed with the cap.

May and her policy chief, Nick Timothy, have both publicly backed government intervention on pricing levels, but more free market voices in the Cabinet oppose this stance.

An unnamed Conservative source told Utility Week: “An absolute cap would distort the market and big suppliers will congregate around that level.”

The source added that the Conservatives now “need to work constructively with the big six on the best solution”.