SNP calls for free national energy switching service

The Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) will push for the introduction of a free national energy switching service to encourage customers who have stuck with the same supplier to shop around.

In its general election manifesto published the morning (27 November), the party set out fresh measures to encourage switching and protect hard-up customers from being ripped off.

It says the switching service would compare the whole market by showing all available energy tariffs with “clear explanations of costs, and average bills”.

The SNP would push for the creation of a new Ofgem database of sticky customers who have not switched supplier in a long time. It says the switching service could contact those on the database to encourage them to seek out cheaper deals.

The manifesto says the party would also support laws requiring suppliers to:

• use clear language when explaining tariffs and costs;
• bill customers at least once a quarter so they are less likely to accumulate debt;
• and contact all customers who have been on the same tariff for at least two years unless it is the cheapest.

It additionally calls for new legislation to cap on the amount of credit that can built up in customers’ account and ensure it is fully repaid if their supplier goes bust.

The manifesto says the SNP will demand the UK accelerates its action to meet the Scottish government’s recently introduced targets to achieve a 75 per cent reduction in emissions by 2035 on the road to net zero emissions “no later” than 2040.

Independence would allow Scotland to go even further on action to tackle climate change as it will not have to rely on the UK government, the document states.

The SNP’s Commons cohort will campaign for the UK government to press for the accelerated deployment of fully operational carbon capture utilisation and storage facilities, like the proposed pilot project at Peterhead that was scrapped by Westminster in 2015.

Its MPs will also push the UK government to fund and resource a dedicated Committee on Climate Change office in Scotland that the Scottish Government is committed to establishing.

And it says that the SNP will press the UK to devolve the powers to Scotland so that it can “properly support” the renewables industry and allow onshore wind and solar power to bid for Contracts for Difference support along with less mature technologies like floating offshore wind and tidal stream generation.

This support would be part of a wider Green Energy Deal that would ensure projects get the “long-term certainty” the manifesto says is needed to support investment.

This deal would also include a reform of the “punitive” transmission charging regime that the manifesto claims discourages investment in Scotland and the establishment of a clear timescale for the delivery of the interconnectors to Scotland’s islands.