Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment he has made of the potential effectiveness of an energy price cap for businesses.

Applying a price cap in the non-domestic market is impractical given the number of different contractual arrangements, the range of prices offered and the risk of market distortion. The Energy Bill Relief Scheme has been designed to offer a comparable level of support to the domestic Energy Price Guarantee by applying a discount to the wholesale element of non-domestic customers’ bills. Legislation came into force on 1 November, shielding businesses across the United Kingdom from soaring energy prices and saving some around half of their wholesale energy costs.