Standard content for Members only
To continue reading this article, please login to your Utility Week account, Start 14 day trial or Become a member.
If your organisation already has a corporate membership and you haven’t activated it simply follow the register link below. Check here.
Energy companies are back in Westminster’s firing line as Labour resurrects an old policy favourite.
The turmoil on Labour’s front bench continues. York MP Rachel Maskell, the shadow environment secretary who has only been in post since September, has quit her role over the government’s EU withdrawal legislation.
And by the time Utility Week is printed, the same issue may have prompted a return to the backbenches for equally short-lived BEIS shadow Clive Lewis.
The need for yet another shadow cabinet reshuffle sparked rumours, denied by the former Labour leader’s office, that Ed Miliband was due to make a comeback in Lewis’s role.
Utility chiefs will be glad if they don’t have to deal again with Miliband, who announced a plan to freeze energy bills at the 2013 Labour annual conference, kicking off the current round of pressure on suppliers.
Iain Wright laid into energy suppliers at a one-off inquiry last week into the implementation of the Competition and Markets Authority energy market investigation. The BEIS select committee chair accused energy suppliers of being locked in an “abusive relationship” with their customers. Wright’s words point to the tone his committee is likely to take in its final report.
However, following Npower’s announcement that it will hike its standard variable tariff by just over 9.8 per cent, shadow chancellor John McDonnell decided to re-release Ed’s greatest hit (see above).
With No 10 examining further moves to reform the energy market in the upcoming consumer green paper, it looks like energy companies are firmly back in the Westminster firing line.
Please login or Register to leave a comment.