Storm Arwen: MPs chastise DNOs over poor communication

SP Energy Networks has “serious questions” to answer about its “failure” to provide accurate information to residents about reconnection times, a Tory MP has said in an emergency House of Commons debate on Wednesday (1 December) about the power outages triggered by Storm Arwen.

John Lamont, MP for Berwickshire, said that “thousands” of his constituents across the Scottish Borders remain without power after the “catastrophic” storm last weekend.

“Many old and vulnerable residents have no power and that has been the case for five days,” he said.

But while joining other MPs paying tribute to the engineers and council workers who have worked “so hard” to get people connected, Lamont said: “Serious questions remain about the failure of SP Energy Networks to provide accurate information to residents about reconnection times”.

Ian Lavery, Labour MP for Wansbeck, also complained about the communication problems suffered by a care home in his Northumberland constituency, which lost its electricity at 2am last Saturday and only had it restored on Monday afternoon.

He said: “The lack of communication was unbelievable. Two people in that home were aged 100 years-plus. There were a lot of people with dementia who were frightened and who could not be moved because it would mean extra confusion. This is not acceptable.”

However, he coupled his criticism with a tribute to the “brilliant job” Northern Powergrid’s workforce and engineers had done getting supplies reconnected.

Kwasi Kwarteng, secretary of state for business and energy, said it was “clearly unacceptable” that customers had waited up to two hours to get through to their network, which he said many had experienced over the weekend.

He said: “The storm hit and the companies did not have the communication networks, the call centres or the people there to deal with the situation.

“There was an issue with communication on the weekend, I am sad to say. There was a huge surge in demand and not enough infrastructure—there were not enough people in the call centres—to deal with the situation.

“For those who continue to be without power, I know their primary question will be ‘when will power be restored?’”

Kwarteng said he has yet to speak to the chief executive of SP Energy Networks.

But following discussions with the CEOs of Northern Powergrid, Electricity North West, and Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks, he said waiting times for calls have been reduced to an average of 10 to 15 minutes.

The government would look into the issues raised by Storm Arwen, like it had done following the power outage that hit large swathes of the electricity in August 2019, Kwarteng said: “It will not be the case that we will simply walk away from it; we will be trying actively to learn lessons.”

According to the Energy Networks Association, 98% of households had been reconnected by 2.30pm on Thursday, leaving around 16,000 homes still without power.

Northern Powergrid said it has restored supplies to more than 230,000 customers as of 3pm on Thursday but 9,700 remained without power.