Call for competition in WA power market THE West Australian government should open up competition in the electricity market for small customers and let providers decide whether it's financially viable, the Economic Regulation Authority (ERA) says. After it was revealed on Sunday that Wesfarmers-owned Kleenheat would challenge debt-laden gas retailer Alinta, ERA joined the state's Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI) in calling for more competition in the power market. ERA chairman Lyndon Rowe said deregulation had allowed private companies to participate at the large and medium end of the electricity retailing, but not at the small end. "Under the legislation, Synergy is the only company that can sell to small-use customers - the government would need to change that ... so you have a similar situation to what we've got in gas," Mr Rowe told ABC radio. The government's argument at the moment is because we don't have cost-reflective prices in electricity, it's unlikely that if they did open it up, then there would be new entrants. We also heard those arguments about gas. Well, that changed on the weekend. We see no reason why the government can't open it up ... and let the market decide when they want to enter it. There's still a 15-20 per cent gap between the cost of producing electricity and charges to customers. Newly installed energy minister Mike Nahan was in briefings in his first full day in the role, and was unable to make an immediate comment. The CCI says WA is the only state where electricity tariffs for small business and residential consumers are set by government and not by an independent regulator or the market, and it wants that to change. Meanwhile, Alinta said it welcomed the competition for gas customers - although it represented a challenge. "We have never taken our customers for granted," Alinta chief executive Jeff Dimery said.