Dr. Paul McGowan:

As the commissioner, Ms MacEvilly, referred to earlier, we now have 744,000 smart meters installed. By the end of this year, we should have more than 1 million, which represents approximately 50% of households. At the moment, people need to opt into a time-of-use tariff. As a nation, we should be looking at whether that is the right model or whether we should have an opt-out model.

We accept that there are issues around data protection that need to be addressed but, given where we are, that is another thing we should be seriously considering.