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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to help protect consumers from unequal variation across England in standing changes on electricity bills.

Standing charges are charges that suppliers pass on to their customers, the largest element of which is the cost of the electricity and gas transmission and distribution networks, which vary depending on the different costs in a geographic area.

The standing charge is passed on to consumers as a flat rate per day rather than as a percentage charge based on how much energy they use. Ofgem requires energy suppliers to separate out the standing charge from the energy unit rate so consumers can see what the different charges amount to.