Tories plan break up of energy oligopoly

We have been studying oligopoly in our A2 micro and the issue of electricity and gas prices has been headline news for some time. Last week the Conservatives announced plans to break up the highly concentrated domestic energy supply market and inject fresh competition. This is reported here in the Guardian. There is a super paragraph that explains the oligopolistic nature of the industry:

“The industry has since consolidated into EDF, E.ON, RWE npower, Centrica, Scottish Power (owned by Iberdrola) and Scottish and Southern Energy, which control the production and supply of electricity and gas to almost all UK households and businesses. Only a handful of small independent power plant operators and tiny suppliers survive. Energy analysts say the market dominance by the Big Six makes it impossible for anyone else to gain a foothold.”

Market dominance is reinforced by the highly vertically integrated nature of these energy giants.

“they own power plants and source the gas themselves to supply their own customers. This means they will always be profitable at a group level because their retail businesses subsidise their power plant arms when generating costs are high and vice-versa”

The energy companies have been accused of engaging in implicit price collusion - tor the main product they most actively sell - direct debit for dual fuel, gas and electricity - the price difference between the cheapest and most expensive is £30 a year or around 60 pence per week. The consumer watchdog EnergyWatch has complained that British consumers are being ripped off by a “comfortable oligopoly” of bloated electricity and gas supply companies.