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Miliband, is still the big topic in energy – and Flint is keen to keep it at the forefront of people's minds. This close to the election, the more publicity the promise gets the better. Bashing the big six is still seen as a vote winner. Behind the pledge, as Flint is eager to stress, are the important structural changes to the market that a Labour government would make. The plan to abolish Ofgem stands, despite the vital role it will play in these reforms. So too does the intention to re-establish an energy pool, potentially piggy-backed on established exchanges. The price freeze will "right the wrongs" inflicted on consumers by the companies, while moves take place behind the scenes to create to a fair system. First things first, the price freeze. With Mili- band telling a party rally two weeks ago that a government under his leadership would cut bills and cap rises, is it still a freeze? "It's a freeze. A freeze," Flint retorts sharply. Her researcher quips that it would be a restric- tion on the suppliers increasing prices over the 20-month period. The definition is a side issue, and clearly an irritant to Flint, but it is important because the companies need clarity. The freeze – Utility Week gets corrected with a stern look for calling it a cap – will not allow any upward movement in the energy price. While a fall in whole- sale costs must be passed on, any subsequent rise will have to be absorbed. The suppliers will have no means to recoup these costs. Two years ago, Flint said: "There's no gain without pain in this", so is this plan designed to make the big six suffer? "It is not about suffering. It is about fairness," she says. "The whole point of the price freeze is to give us 20 months to reform the energy market. The other rea- son goes back to when there was a substantial dip in the wholesale cost and the evidence shows those reductions were not passed on to consumers. We are compensating people for that." However, as we delve deeper into the freeze, Utility Week is told it would not be Labour imposing these cuts; it would be the much maligned – and still to be scrapped – regulator Ofgem. Flint, walking what must be a well-trodden path in her mind, sets out her first few days in office as energy secretary. She says emergency legislation would give Ofgem the power, and the duty, to force suppliers to pass on falling wholesale prices. This would prevent the big firms locking in profit margin when the freeze is imposed. "It has become clear to me we need a power like this because Ofgem has confirmed in two reports – in 2011 and 2014 – that it believes there is evidence wholesale cost falls are not being passed on. We need to tackle this," she says with conviction. "I know a number of companies have reduced their prices, but that is only for gas. There is a role for the regulator in saying whether those reductions are fair for customers or not." As to what makes a price fair, Flint is cagey. "As much as interviewers have tried to tempt me, I've never got into what is an acceptable level of profit. What I can say is, does the bill payer get a fair share of the divi- dend or benefit when things are going well? I don't think they do." Flint, aer another pop at the big six, returns to profit levels. European utilities and the UK supermarkets oper- ate on a profit margin of about 3 per cent, she says. The 5 per cent margin that Centrica and SSE have in the past claimed as fair is, according to Flint, "over the odds". So Flint will use Ofgem to cut bills and make them "fair", before making the regulator fall on its sword, ulti- mately to be replaced by a new regulator. Or, as energy secretary Ed Davey regularly taunts Flint with in West- minster, a rebranded "Ofgem 2". "Ofgem in its current guise doesn't really fit in terms of what we need a regulator for this sector to do over the next 50 years. That's why I don't want to tinker with the present arrangements," she says, in answer to the rebranding accusa- tions. "We need to have a real sense in the public's mind that we've got a new regula- tor dealing with the problems we've highlighted over the past few years. There will be a number of tasks done by the present regulator that will be carried forward, but in a number of areas things will be different." Labour's energy watchdog will expand Ofgem's cur- rent remit to include off-grid customers and to champion community energy, on top of pulling the big boys into line, obeying the new authority. But Labour has an authority problem of its own, namely the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). The investigation into the energy sector launched last year was welcomed by the coalition parties. Davey said it would deal with the problems in the sector and both the Conservatives and Lib Dems said they would follow the recommendations made by the CMA. Flint refuses to promise to follow the CMA's recom- mendations. Labour will press ahead with its plans for the market regardless, especially when it comes to end- ing vertical integration. "I'm still committed to doing something in this area," Flint said. She adds: "This is not about companies completely divesting themselves of different parts of their organi- sation, it's about giving transparency so people can be reassured there isn't gaming going on from one part of the business to another." The final element of the overhaul of the energy mar- ket is the re-introduction of an energy trading pool. She swats away suggestions this would be a similar system to the pool the Labour government abolished in 2000. "It's not about going back to the pool of yesteryear. What we are trying to do here is create transparency," Flint said. Labour is looking at the APX and N2EX pools, not only for inspiration, but because they could be used to speed up the introduction of a pool without having the complicated and potentially time-consuming build stage. Trading 100 per cent of energy through these "would have the same effect as introducing a pool". So the energy revolution is primed and ready to go. It will be led, intellectually at least, by Flint and Mili- band should Labour win the election in May. But the dirty work will be le to Ofgem. The regulator will be told to crack down on the sector before it too faces the wrath of Flint. She said she intends to take up office in the Depart- ment of Energy and Climate Change aer 7 May, going somewhere she has never been before. If she does, it will be unchartered territory for the energy sector as well. UTILITY WEEK | 27Th March - 2nd aprIL 2015 | 11 E l E ct i o n c o u n td o w n : 4 1 d ay s to g o "It's not about [the big six] suffering. It's about fairness " "