Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, pursuant to the Oral Answer of 6 November 2014, Official Report, column 955, on off-grid gas customers, if he will make it his policy to include the off-grid gas market under the remit of Ofgem.

The remit of Ofgem is to regulate the monopoly companies that run the electricity and gas networks. There is no natural or structural monopoly for supply and distribution in off-gas grid fuels; on the contrary, it is a competitive supply market.

The Federation of Petroleum Suppliers’ Code of Practice is a binding code for their members engaged in domestic heating oil supply. Their Customer Charter also provides advice on the level of services members are expected to provide to their customers, the process for making complaints about a supplier, and advice for those with payment difficulties. The UK Liquid Petroleum Gas trade body has produced a “Vulnerable Persons Protocol” for LPG suppliers which sets out the protection embodied in contracted supply arrangements, arrangements for vulnerable customers, for customers in payment difficulties, and delivery priorities. These two sectors provide the overwhelming majority of off-grid fuel, and these trade bodies cover over 80% of the domestic heating oil used in mainland UK and 99% of bulk LPG supply.

Customers of heat networks are also technically ‘off gas grid’ (representing 2% of heat demand in buildings) and they are also benefiting from development of industry-led customer protection schemes and the introduction of heat metering and billing regulations.