Guto Bebb
Main Page: Guto Bebb (Independent - Aberconwy)(12 years, 10 months ago)
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Chris Evans
As I said during last week’s debate, it is all very well to tell people to shop around but, if all the energy companies are putting up their prices across the board, how can people shop around? I also said that energy is not a luxury item—people have to have it. It is not possible to have superfast energy in the same way as it is to have superfast broadband. How can people shop around? It is a failure of the market. If we are going to ask people to shop around, the Government need to encourage more entrants into the market.
Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. On the failure of the market, energy prices in Scandinavia—in Sweden and Denmark—are higher than those in the UK, possibly because the UK has a more free market. In Scandinavia, however, they make a more comprehensive effort to make sure that they are energy-efficient, which makes a real difference in terms of fuel poverty, because their prices are actually higher.
Chris Evans
I still believe that the only way to drive down prices is to have more competitors. We have only six companies as competitors, they all seem to be pushing up their prices together—I am not saying that that is what they are doing, because a number of inquiries have said that they are not—and the regulator does not seem to be doing anything about it. I do not agree with that situation. We need to look at ways to bring in more entrants into the market. As I have said, however, that is not a debate for now.
The introduction of winter fuel payments, central heating programmes and the energy efficiency commitment have all played their part in easing the pain that people have felt in meeting their energy costs. However, I cannot talk about fuel poverty or pensioners in my constituency without mentioning the cut to the winter fuel payment.