Khan defends London Power after criticism

Sadiq Khan has been asked to apologise for his energy company London Power’s £880,000 loss in its first year of operation.

The capital’s mayor was quizzed at City Hall last week about the loss by Emma Best, a Conservative member of the Greater London Assembly.

London Power, which manages the contract with Octopus, posted an annual loss of £880,000 for the year ending March 2020.

Replying to Best’s question, Khan said the loss covers London Power’s set-up and launch costs and only reflects a “couple of months” of trading.

“All start-ups face one-off costs related to set-up and launch, which take time to pay back. The cost-effectiveness of London Power is growing over time as we acquire more and more customers,” he said, adding that the venture had already saved its 5,500 customers around £700,000 on their bills by the end of March.

This exchange follows criticism of Khan at the assembly’s mayoral question time last month over the marketing budget for London Power.

Conservative Assembly member Tony Arbour said: “The marketing has not been very successful and that it has in fact been extremely poor value for Londoners.”

Khan said that London Power had been forced to suspend its marketing activities due to the pandemic but that these would escalate as the capital comes out of lockdown.

He added that the team that would ordinarily work with London Power to maximise customer uptake was not available because City Hall has been focused on tackling the pandemic.

Khan said: “Once lockdown is lifted, I am confident that we will restart the marketing and we will see an increase in the number of customers being London Power customers.”