Bulb, Britain’s seventh-biggest energy supplier, is facing collapse within days amid eleventh-hour talks between the government and the company’s biggest secured creditor.
Sky News has learnt that the company, which launched in 2015 and has amassed 1.7 million customers, is expected to appoint insolvency practitioners imminently.
The precise timing remained unclear on Monday because of the complexity of the looming administration process and ongoing talks between the government and Sequoia Economic Infrastructure Income Fund, which has an outstanding secured loan of roughly £50m to Bulb’s parent company Simple Energy, according to industry sources.
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Why the energy price cap is ‘failing’ the UK
Sequoia is said to have demanded the repayment of its loan prior to Bulb being placed into administration, they added.
A range of government departments and Ofgem, the industry regulator, began accelerating contingency plans for the collapse of Bulb last month.
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Bulb executives and their advisors have been working on an emergency sale of the company, with the likes of Octopus Energy, Ovo Energy, Shell Energy Retail and Centrica, the owner of British Gas, expressing varying degrees of interest.
The ‘challenger’ energy company has also made a series of requests to the government in the last few weeks to help it structure a rescue support package, but these have been rejected, according to another industry executive.
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Talks about a solvent rescue deal have also faded, they said.
Bulb’s demise would mark by far the biggest insolvency of the crisis engulfing the sector.
Image: Bulb would be the biggest company to collapse as a result of the crisis engulfing the sector
Its customer base is nearly as large in aggregate as the roughly-20 suppliers which have collapsed during the last three months.
About 2 million households have seen their energy provider succumb to soaring wholesale prices since the start of September.
Bulb’s demise may place at long-term risk the jobs of the roughly-1000 people who work for the company, which was launched in 2015 by Amit Gudka and Hayden Wood, although the bulk of its workforce will not be at risk in the short-term as they will be required to continue in their roles during the special administration.
A Bulb spokesperson said: “We’ve decided to support Bulb being placed into special administration, which means it will continue to operate with no interruption of service or supply to members.
“If you’re a Bulb member, please don’t worry as your energy supply is secure and all credit balances are protected.”
Significantly, the insolvency of Bulb will entail the first use of a resolution process called a Special Administration Regime (SAR), which would guarantee funding for Bulb from the Treasury while administrators seek a restructuring deal, buyer or transfer of the customer base.
That would mean hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money being used to fund Bulb’s obligations in the wholesale energy markets to ensure that it can continue operating.
Sky News revealed in September that Ofgem had lined up Teneo Restructuring to oversee the insolvency of a large energy supplier, although it was unclear whether it or AlixPartners, Bulb’s restructuring advisor, would handle the administration.
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Building resiliency into the UK energy market
The largest of the suppliers to collapse during the current crisis, Avro Energy, had about 580,000 customers.
Bulb has been regarded for some time as being too large to go through Ofgem’s Supplier of Last Resort (SOLR) process – the method by which all of the UK’s other collapsed energy companies have been resolved in recent months.
In the SOLR process, a company’s operating licence is removed and bids are sought from other industry players for its customer base, with losses incurred by the acquirers of those customers then recouped through an industry levy.
Under the SAR, the administrator has a legal duty to consider the interest of customers, unlike a conventional insolvency process where the primary duty is to creditors.
In a long-established statement on its website about SAR, Ofgem said a memorandum of understanding had been drawn up between itself, the Treasury and BEIS, adding: “Provisions for this administration scheme for energy suppliers were included in the 2011 Energy Act.
“It has never been used before because a large energy supplier has never been insolvent.”
A government spokesman did not immediately comment on Monday but said three weeks ago: “Ofgem – as the expert regulator – is monitoring the situation across the energy market for the continued impacts on high worldwide wholesale gas prices.
“We have put in place the powers and robust processes to ensure customers do not experience any disruption to their energy supply and that costs are minimised if a supplier should exit the market.”
Image: About two million customers have seen their energy supplier collapse since the start of September
The regulator added in late October: “There has been an unprecedented increase in global gas prices which is putting financial pressure on suppliers.
“We know this is a worrying time for many people and our number one priority is protecting customers.
“In the event a supplier fails, Ofgem and government have robust processes in place to ensure customers’ electricity and gas supply continue and domestic customers’ credit balances are protected.”
The ongoing crisis in the energy sector has sparked demands from some executives for a removal of the industry price cap or a bailout fund to help with the rescue of smaller suppliers.
Kwasi Kwarteng, the business secretary, has rejected both demands.
Last week, Ofgem said it would seek to adjust the industry price cap more frequently as a result of recent challenges, meaning British consumers are expected to face even higher bills in the years ahead.
The collapse of one of the biggest challengers to the big players – the largest of which are British Gas, E.ON Next, EDF Energy, Scottish Power and Ovo Energy,, which acquired SSE’s retail business – would be a blow to hopes of a more varied and competitive market.
Octopus Energy, which like Bulb supplies 100% renewable energy, has established itself as an independent, well-funded challenger and now boasts 2.5 million customers across more than 4 million accounts.
An expert in financial regulation at one of the big four accountancy firms is in talks to become the inaugural boss of English football’s powerful new watchdog.
Sky News has learnt that Richard Monks, a partner at EY, is the leading contender to become chief executive of the Independent Football Regulator (IFR).
The new body will be formally established once the Football Governance Bill receives Royal Assent, which is expected this month.
Mr Monks spent 18 years at the Financial Conduct Authority and its predecessor regulator, the Financial Services Authority, before becoming chair of the G20/OECD Taskforce for Consumer Financial Protection, according to his LinkedIn profile.
He became a partner at EY, where he focuses on financial regulation, in the autumn of 2022.
The prospective choice of a chief executive of the IFR with no professional experience of the football industry may spark alarm among club executives who will face an onerous new regulatory regime overseen by the IFR.
In recent weeks, football industry executives have circulated rumours that the IFR boss was likely to emerge from the professional services sector.
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It was unclear this weekend whether other candidates were vying with Mr Monks for the post.
The IFR has already been set up on a ‘shadow’ basis, with Martyn Henderson, former chief executive of the Sports Grounds Safety Authority, appointed in December 2023 as interim chief operating officer of the football watchdog.
The EY partner is understood to have held talks with David Kogan, the government’s preferred choice for the watchdog’s chairmanship but whose formal appointment has been delayed by an investigation sparked by his previous donations to Labour politicians.
William Shawcross, the commissioner for public appointments, is investigating the process through which Mr Kogan was recruited to the role, and is thought likely to produce his report in the coming weeks.
Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, told MPs last month that she was delegating the final decision on Mr Kogan’s appointment to the sports minister.
Stuart Andrew, the shadow culture minister, said at the time: “The public has a right to know whether this was a fair and impartial process, or yet another case of political patronage disguised as due diligence.
“The decision to launch an inquiry is welcome [and] must include scrutiny of [Sir] Keir Starmer, his advisers, and whether any conflicts of interest were properly declared.”
If Mr Kogan’s appointment is ratified, the appointment of a chief executive would be a crucial step in paving the way for the most radical reforms to the supervision of English football in decades.
The legislation includes a new licensing regime for clubs, measures to ensure greater fan engagement and a backstop power allowing the IFR to impose a financial settlement on the Premier League in relation to distributions to English Football League clubs.
Revisions to the Bill have seen a requirement for the IFR to take decisions about club takeovers in the context of the government’s foreign and trade policy removed.
If Mr Monks does land the IFR chief executive’s post, ministers are likely to argue that his expertise as a regulator will balance Mr Kogan’s decades of experience as a negotiator of sports media rights deals.
Last year, Mr Kogan acted as the lead negotiator for the Women’s Super League and Championship on their latest five-year broadcasting deals with Sky – the immediate parent company of Sky News – and the BBC.
His current roles include advising the chief executives of CNN, the American broadcast news network, and The New York Times Company on talks with digital platforms about the growing influence of artificial intelligence on their industries.
The creation of the IFR was pledged by the last Conservative government in the wake of the furore over the failed European Super League project in 2021.
Its establishment comes with the top tier of the professional game gripped by civil war, with Abu Dhabi-owned Manchester City at the centre of a number of legal cases with the Premier League over the club’s financial affairs.
The Premier League has also been keen to agree a long-delayed financial redistribution deal with the EFL before the regulator is formally launched.
Tentative talks between representatives of both factions failed to produce meaningful progress, however.
This weekend, EY declined to comment on Mr Monks’s behalf, while the Department for Culture, Media and Sport has been approached for comment.
An independent review of the water industry is to recommend sweeping changes to the way the sector is managed, including the potential replacement of Ofwat with a strengthened body combining economic and environmental regulation.
Former Bank of England governor Sir Jon Cunliffe will publish the findings of the Independent Water Commission on Monday, with stakeholders across the industry expecting significant changes to regulation to be at its heart.
The existing regulator Ofwat has been under fire from all sides in recent years amid rising public anger at levels of pollution and the financial management of water companies.
Campaigners and politicians have accused Ofwat of failing to hold water operators to account, while the companies complain that its focus on keeping bills down has prevented appropriate investment in infrastructure.
In an interim report, published in June, Sir Jon identified the presence of multiple regulators with overlapping responsibilities as a key issue facing the industry.
While Ofwat is the economic regulator, the Environment Agency has responsibility for setting pollution standards, alongside the Drinking Water Inspectorate.
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Sir Jon’s final report is expected to include a recommendation that the government consider a new regulator that combines Ofwat’s economic regulatory powers with the water-facing responsibilities currently managed by the EA.
In his interim report, Sir Jon said options for reform ranged from “rationalising” existing regulation to “fundamental, structural options for integrating regulatory remits and functions”.
He is understood to have discussed the implications of fundamental reform with senior figures in industry and government in the last week as he finalised his report.
Environment Secretary Steve Reed is expected to launch a consultation on the proposals following publication of the commission report.
The commission is also expected to recommend a “major shift” in the model of economic regulation, which currently relies on econometric modelling, to a supervisory approach that takes more account of individual company circumstances.
On Monday, the government’s long-awaited review into the UK’s water industry will finally report.
The expectation is that it will recommend sweeping changes – including the abolition of the regulator, Ofwat.
But frustrated customers of the water companies could rightly complain that the process of taking on this failing sector and its regulator has been slow and ineffective.
They may be forgiven for going further and suggesting that how Labour has dealt with water is symbolic of their inability to make an impact across many areas of public life, leaving many of their voters disappointed.
This is an industry that has been visibly and rapidly declining for decades, with the illegal sewage dumping and rotting pipes in stark contrast with the vast salaries and bonuses paid out to their executives.
It doesn’t take a review to see what’s gone wrong. Most informed members of the public could explain what has happened in a matter of minutes.
And yet, despite 14 years in opposition with plenty of time to put together a radical plan, a review is exactly what the government decided on before taking on Ofwat.
Month after month, they were asked if they believed the water industry regulator was fit for purpose despite the obvious disintegration on their watch. Every time the answer was ‘yes’.
As in so many areas of government, Labour, instead of acting, needed someone else to make the decision for them, meaning that it has taken over a year to come to the simple conclusion that the regulator is in fact, not fit for purpose.
As they enter their second year in office, maybe this can provide a lesson they desperately need to learn if they want to turn around their fortunes.
That bold decisions do not require months of review, endless consultations, or outside experts to endlessly analyse the problem.
They just need to get on with it. Voters will thank them.
Sir Jon has said the water industry requires long-term strategic planning and stability in order to make it attractive to “low-risk, low-return investors”.
The water industry has long complained that the current model, in which companies are benchmarked against a notional model operator, and penalised for failing to hit financial and environmental standards, risks a “doom loop”.
Thames Water, currently battling to complete an equity process to avoid falling into special administration, has said the imposition of huge fines for failing to meet pollution standards is one of the reasons it is in financial distress.
Publication of the Independent Commission report comes after the Environment Agency published figures showing that serious pollution incidents increased by 60% in 2024, and as Thames Water imposes a hosepipe ban on 15m customers.
Ofwat, Water UK and the Department for the Environment all declined to comment.
The first Post Office Capture conviction is to be sent to the Court of Appeal, Sky News understands, in a “breakthrough” moment in the IT scandal.
The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) has decided to refer the case of sub-postmistress Patricia Owen, who was convicted in 1998 of theft.
Mrs Owen was found guilty by a jury based on evidence from the faulty IT software Capture, which was used in 2,500 branches between 1992 and 1999, before the Horizon Post Office scandal.
Image: Pat Owen, pictured here with her husband David, always maintained her innocence but died in 2003 with a criminal record
It comes after Sky News revealed that a damning report into Capture, which could help overturn criminal convictions, had been unearthed after nearly 30 years.
The decision to refer the first-ever Capture case to the Court of Appeal has been made on the grounds that Mrs Owen’s prosecution was an “abuse of process”.
The development has been described by victims’ lawyer Neil Hudgell as “hugely pivotal”.
“The Court of Appeal don’t receive that many referrals that start at the CCRC, and most get turned away, so it’s a very high bar to even get cases from the CCRC to the Court of Appeal…”
“I think it will be a real shot in the arm to all the other Capture victims who are waiting for their cases to be determined by the CCRC.”
Mr Hudgell described the report found earlier this year – written by computer experts in 1998 and highly critical of Capture – as “significantly tipping the balance”.
Image: Lawyer Neil Hudgell says development is ‘hugely pivotal’
Sky News found that the Post Office knew about the report at the time and continued to prosecute sub-postmasters based on Capture evidence.
Pat Owen always maintained her innocence but died in 2003 with a criminal record before the wider Post Office scandal came to light.
Her daughter Juliet Shardlow said she cried when she heard the news that her mother’s case would be referred to the Court of Appeal.
“I feel angry that she is not here because she died before her time… we will be there – we will be sitting there in that front row.
“I can’t put it into words because it’s still all a shock that we are where we are and that later this year, or next year, we might have what we set out to get… justice for her.”
Image: Juliet Shardlow is seeking justice for her mother
The CCRC is currently investigating 30 cases potentially related to the Capture software system.
Twenty-seven of those cases are now assigned to case review managers and under “active review”, with a further three cases in the preparatory stages.
The CCRC has described a “challenge” over determining “whether cases involved the use of Capture at the time of the alleged offences”.
In a letter written to Liam Byrne, chair of the Business and Trade Committee, and seen by Sky News, it said that information the Post Office has provided “does not, in most cases, show whether it was installed and in operation at the time of the alleged offending”.
It also mentioned that the Post Office is reviewing “a significant amount of data which may contain further information”.
A Post Office spokesperson said: “While it is not appropriate for us to comment on specific cases, we have been very concerned about the reported problems relating to the use of the Capture software, and we are sincerely sorry for past failings that have caused suffering to postmasters.
“We are determined that past wrongs are put right and continue to support the government’s work in this area as well as fully co-operate with the Criminal Cases Review Commission.”