Received from: Prospect
Congress believes the UK’s model of economic regulation is in urgent need of review. Strategically and socially important industries risk being held back, while the needs of our wider economy and society are not being met.
The approaches pursued by many economic regulators remain marked by their origins in successive waves of privatisation.
These technocratic, cost-cutting regimes fail to take account of the social and distributional dimension of what are often essential basic services, or the strategic importance of essential economic infrastructure.
In the energy sector, for example, Ofgem did not anticipate the collapse of low-cost energy providers, requiring the government to step in with bail-out measures, and witnessed the forcible instalment of pre-payment meters for households struggling with energy costs. Its regime of price and cost controls fails to take adequate account of the need to reduce workforce stress and fatigue or deliver the large-scale transformation needed to meet net zero targets.
Comparable concerns have been raised in relation to other economic regulators including Ofcom and the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
Congress calls on the TUC General Council to lobby for a new, more sophisticated approach to economic regulation that ensures commercial and cost considerations are balanced by explicit responsibility, oversight and provision for vital public priorities such as:
i. social justice and fair access to essential basic services
ii. workforce resilience, workforce development and the need to maintain decent pay and working conditions
iii. increased long-term investment in R&D, innovation, and infrastructure needed to support the UK’s industrial strategy and sustainability goals.
Prospect