Speeches by McKinnell.

“When will that happen?”

“I appreciate that we are short of time, but I do not really understand why you are not collecting the data. That does not really answer the question. I would have thought that if you wanted things to improve, you would need data to drive that. It does not really make sense.”

“That hasn’t been regular in the past?”

“That’s helpful. To come back to Ofwat, my understanding is that you do not collect data in the same way as Ofgem and Ofcom do. Why not? Are you going to do that? It would clearly be helpful in achieving what you are trying to achieve.”

“So there is a standing charge for a digital phone line; you have to pay a minimum.”

“Not in my experience.”

“Can I put a challenge to you on that digital switchover? One of the issues that Martin Lewis mentioned in his evidence was the frustration with standing charges in the energy sector. My impression—correct me if I am wrong—is that we are basically now introducing a standard charge for broadband access through that trans…”

“It may just be me.”

“Some of that sounds a little bit subjective in my view, but I appreciate that we cannot take all the time on water. In terms of the other provision, what are we doing to make sure customers have a good experience?”

“I think we are digressing from the main consumer experience issue. One thing I noted from what you were saying is the amount of data you collect and analyse. I will come back to you later, Mr Walters, about data and Ofwat, because I understand that you are not so good at collecting data there. I’ll go now to Mr Jarvis.”

“How are you driving up consumer experience, particularly for vulnerable customers, but also for all customers, given that there is a challenge with competition in the market?”

“I entirely agree, and my hon. Friend has anticipated a point that I was going to make. The increased court days are clearly vital to maintaining productivity and the efficiency of the use of court time, although that only works if the court system itself is working. We have seen very good examples of the way in which t…”

“It is an honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Sarah Russell), and indeed, to follow all the Members who have contributed to what has been a very thoughtful debate. There seems to be a huge amount of cross-party consensus, indicated by the Chair of the Justice Committee, my hon. Friend the Member fo…”

“Thank you all for being here. At the risk of asking a question so broad that you do not know where to start, in your opinion, Martin, where are the biggest challenges for customers in the water, energy and broadband sectors at the moment?”

“On the different types of customers who experience these challenges, I recently heard from a constituent who is 85, and out of nowhere landed a bill of £575. It was all to do with the company being unable to take smart meter readings, so they had made an estimate that was quite wild, given his energy use. He had been w…”

“At the risk of only scratching the surface, I will hand back to you, Chair.”

“That is an incredibly comprehensive reply. It is interesting that you referred to the challenges for vulnerable customers; in terms of the breadth of the challenge, unless someone makes a full-time job of this, it is very difficult to navigate very complex systems, as you rightly identified, even if you are not vulnera…”

“I want to ask about consumer experience. The suggested framing of this question is, “What are doing to ensure that consumers have similar experiences?” However, I would frame it as, “What are you doing to ensure that consumers have better experiences?” The fact is that at the moment a huge number of consumers are not h…”

“Sorry to interrupt you. I appreciate that there will always be individual circumstances in which a customer may have had a good experience, but my question was about what you are doing to ensure that experience is improved overall; focusing on one consumer experience is not really going to address that. What are you do…”

“What are the consequences for water companies for not responding to consumers in the way that you would expect?”