Better Protections for Life Support Customers

The Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) welcomes the Essential Services Commission’s (ESC) draft decision on better protections for life support customers in Victoria. People who rely on life support equipment are often some of the most vulnerable consumers in the energy market, with multiple and complex support needs. For those customers, the register is a crucial safeguard against harms created by planned and unplanned interruptions.

VCOSS acknowledges that there are some well-documented issues with the current operation of the register, as was found through the 2024 Network Outage Review. In that context, the ESC’s review is both necessary and timely.

We believe that the changes laid out in the draft decision are an improvement on the initial proposal. It is our view that the proposed reforms are better geared towards minimising the risk of harm to customers with life support needs than those in the initial consultation paper. VCOSS is pleased so see how this proposal has evolved, as it is clear that the ESC has taken feedback from community sector respresentatives and consumer advocates onboard.

Finally, VCOSS is very pleased to see that there are no references in the draft decision to the assertion, advanced by some energy businesses and expressed in the initial consultation paper, that some consumers deliberately misuse the life support register to avoid disconnection for non-payment. It was our view that this was an entirely unfounded assumption based on a misunderstanding of consumer behaviour and the reasons for an expanded life support register.