Emma Pinchbeck

So the one thing I wanted to get off my chest in this conversation from having sat in the chair in 2022 when we had to figure out a response...

We are connected with these big global markets.

It's very difficult for us to do anything about supply.

Honestly, I spent a pregnancy walking everyone up the hill that we couldn't fix the energy crisis.

I've got a very... Based on how big I was about how far the conversation had gone and how much we had to fix before imminent baby.

Like, he's now...

You'd think we'd have learned some lessons.

But we spent a lot of time walking everyone up the hill that there were very little tools on the supply side of energy.

New power plant, North Sea, you name it.

We have so few tools because we're connected to this global market and we're not and never will be a price setter.

And we have a very gas-based economy.

So you can't fix it on the supply side in a quick way that helps people.

What you can do is do something about demand.

We have a huge amount of gas going into heating in this country relative to other parts of the UK.

Part of your question about why have we got higher prices?

We have more gas coming in.

Half of it is going to heating.

We haven't invested in an energy market that can reward people for having flexible tariffs and services.

We've put all our costs onto electricity, not gas, so people are not incentivised to get an electric vehicle or a heat pump.

We have not thought about any of these technologies or energy efficiency as a way of managing energy security, and that was the one thing we learned about 2022.