Ms Issy Petrie:

We submitted a recommendation for legislation on protections for vulnerable customers to the consultation on the energy poverty action plan. Vulnerable customer protections are really important both in offering additional protections from disconnection and a preventative protection whereby there is a requirement to move customers to the most economic tariff for their payment type. We were very pleased to see a commitment to extend the vulnerable customer definition to include financial vulnerability. However, that commitment was time limited to two winters, one of which has passed. We have not seen progress on that, which is disappointing. It is an important mechanism into the future and we would like to see it continue beyond the two years for which a commitment was given. As well as protections, it offers a flag to suppliers in the market as to which customers need support. It is important to keep that mechanism operating in the market.

I am not sure whether we have included research on community energy advisers in the report. We certainly can send on some of the research we have done into examples elsewhere.

In Manchester, I think they are called green energy doctors, and there are examples in Scotland where they are locally based and respond well to people's needs. They provide good examples of what we could see.