Speeches by Fahnbulleh.

“The system has a kind of backstop built into it, which is the guarantee system. In instances where a supplier goes bust—so far, that is not the world we are in—the guarantor will and should pick it up, and they will commission installers to come and remediate the work. That is the expectation. It is a 25-year guarantee…”

“There is a fine balance. If you have done work that is not up to the standard required and set out in the PAS standards and requirements, it is your responsibility to fix it, so we have to make sure that we are not letting people off the hook. The experience so far, and certainly the intel that we are getting—for examp…”

“Absolutely. In the vast majority of cases, the system should hold. There will be a minority where the work has either been done by installers that perhaps should not be installing—there will be a tiny minority of cases where that is true—or there has been such a breach of trust that the consumer does not feel confident…”

“At the moment, pretty confident. Based on the data that we have so far, it does seem to be an issue with solid wall, in part because of the complexity of the installations, and targeted at ECO4 and GBIS, but we will absolutely keep it under review. For example, we were doing audits of the capital schemes to make sure t…”

“The headline is that the system of quality assurance that we have is not fit for purpose. I do not think that is unique. We think we have a particular systemic issue around ECO4 and GBIS and solid wall insulation, but there is a wider point that, in the end, our system of quality assurance and consumer protection where…”

“As I said before, our capital schemes, in particular, are telling a much stronger story. We are still trying to get a full picture—a big enough sample—so that I can speak with full confidence, but at the moment, from what we are getting, it looks like night and day. What do we know about those schemes? First, there is …”

“I will let Jess speak about the evidence more broadly. I have spoken to the Scottish Government. We know that they are delivering it in a slightly different way. My three takeaways are these. First, being area-based is an important ingredient here, because you can deliver at scale and bring partners together. Secondly,…”

“I think there were five questions in that, so I will take each in turn. Is the inheritance really tough? Absolutely. Is the confidence in the system not where it needs to be? Absolutely. That is the backdrop, and the job is to try to turn that around. I am confident that we can turn it around. Let me take each of the p…”

“The energy sector is dominated by men, as I am finding. There is a big push across the sector, but we are particularly exercised by it as a Department and trying to get more women in. I think about the warm homes plan: if we get that right, we will be creating jobs in every part of the country. Whether that is the work…”

“Amazing. I strongly encourage it!”

“The rules are very clear. It is clear that, with the exception of particular circumstances, suppliers cannot bill customers for energy that was consumed more than 12 months previously, but there are clearly instances where that rule is not playing out in the way that is set out on paper. There are some grey areas where…”

“There are two things I would say. Ofgem’s expectation on this is very clear, and the direction that has been given from the Government is also very clear. On the evidence that we have to date, in the year to September ’24, just over 3,000 cases relating to back billing went through the Energy Ombudsman. It is of that m…”

“Absolutely. I think a lot of people will find their energy bills—”

“To be fair, on energy bills, there has been lots of work to try to make them simpler, but for your average consumer, they are still very complicated, not least because of the way that we structure tariffs. We are thinking about ways in which we can make energy bills more accessible and simpler for consumers, and more t…”

“We are doing a wider piece of work on consumer confidence in the system. We are looking at a suite of things. My objective, and the objective I have been set by my boss, is to make sure that the energy system works for consumers, that it is accessible, fair and transparent, and that people feel like it is on their side…”

“Not just back billing, but across the piece. I will give you the example of the Energy Ombudsman. That is something that is there and available to all consumers, but a lot of consumers do not know they have that point of redress. One of the things that we are looking at through the review is how we make the system far …”

“As part of the review, we are looking at all the options. The call for evidence closed at the end of February. Many ideas have come through that, including a statutory ombudsman. We are going to look at it in the round. We are doing a root-and-branch review of both Ofgem and the ombudsman that looks at everything—their…”

“There is a systemic problem that stems from the fact that we have had problems in this sector, without a doubt. Therefore, you have a combination: the fact that things are a long way from being perfect and the lack of confidence that you are being treated fairly by the system, which compounds that because consumers wil…”

“Let me start by saying that there are clear expectations in the licence conditions. What we expect from suppliers is written there in black and white. If there are breaches of those conditions, of course there should be financial penalties. Last year Ofgem fined—”

“When we think about the powers that are available to the regulator, the question is: what is the sanction that shifts behaviour where things are not going right? But there are also things like automatic compensation, which is one of the things we are looking at through the review. There are two parts of it. The first i…”