["Journal of Law and Society, Volume 49, Issue 1, Page 118-150, March 2022. ", "\nAbstract\nThis article is concerned with how statutory duties structure regulatory decisions. Rather than focusing on the role of the courts, we explore statutory interpretation by a regulator as a quasi‐autonomous exercise, with external influences and internal norms and customs. To investigate this further, we conducted a series of semi‐structured elite interviews with senior members of the energy ‘regulatory community’, past and present. Energy regulation has been selected as a case study due to the controversies in recent years over the legitimate limits of economic regulation, as successive governments have imposed broader public interest goals on the regulator, resulting in a proliferation of statutory objectives. This increased complexity has arguably obscured the appropriate contours and rationales of economic regulation. Nevertheless, it is unrealistic to completely separate regulatory policy and politics.\n"]