The MPs argue that Britain has not necessarily benefited from its early move into liberalized energy supply, despite the affirmations from watchdog Ofgem that liberalization has lowered prices for end users.
The select committee’s report suggest that the UK is increasingly reliant on the rapid development of similarly liberalized markets in continental Europe in order that a larger, more transparent forward wholesale gas market can be created.
The UK is already becoming more reliant on European gas imports as its own North Sea reserves decline. The British authorities have been especially critical in recent times of the perceived malfunctioning in European wholesale markets as gas prices in the UK have reached hitherto unseen levels.
However the DTI report claims that the problems of limited access to the continental pipeline network will take years to overcome because of legacy contracts with the big European utilities that have a considerable period left to run.
