It is easy to decry the reducing number of domestic energy suppliers as being bad for competition. Trawl the industry journals and common gathering points, and you’ll hear plenty of chatter about the merger of SSE and Npower being anti-competitive.

For us, this misses the wider point. 70% of domestic consumers are currently sitting on deemed rates; paying well over the odds for the privilege of not engaging with the de-regulated market in any way. It bothers two-thirds of consumers not a jot that two big players have just become one – they’d rather not deal with any of them.

The issue isn’t number of suppliers in the market, it’s one of consumer trust. Let’s first see suppliers building trust up with the consumer, and offering at least a little encouragement to participate in the market. Only then should we actually be sad to see any suppliers go…

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