What is liberalisation of the European Union’s gas and electricity markets about? This question is worth asking because the European Commission has been preoccupied with how liberalisation needs to be introduced, rather than with its purpose.

Last month, this preoccupation reached fever pitch as a long-awaited package of proposals was adopted by the Commission, including a requirement that the EU’s big energy companies should unbundle their gas and electricity networks from their supply businesses, either by establishing fully independent system operators or by way of complete ownership separation.