Scrap energy price cap to prevent further bailouts, urges free market think tank

Commenting on the £1.7bn taxpayer bailout of Bulb Energy, Andy Mayer, Environment, Energy and Infrastructure Analyst at free market think tank the Institute of Economic Affairs, said:

“While the energy price cap remains, and each Bulb customer is costing the company an average of £400 per year more than they can charge, there is no prospect of rescuing the business.

“This ‘loan’ is a bailout. Taxpayers will pay for both their own bills and Bulb’s, all to maintain a political fiction of low energy prices.

“A fiction that also means private investment will drain from the market provoking further collapses and limiting the prospect of a supply side response to reduce the cost of gas.

“The government needs to stop tinkering at our expense, fix the source of the problem, scrap the cap today and open the spigots to domestic fracking and storage tomorrow.”