UK government stalling on electricity bill savings says Liverpool MEP. (Garston and Halewood Liberal Democrats)

Garston and Halewood Liberal Democrats <info@garstonld.org.uk>

UK government stalling on electricity bill savings says Liverpool MEP.

August 19, 2007 12:00 AM

Chris Davies MEP for the North West of England North West households could be missing out on electricity savings of up to £80 per year because of government delays.

Smart electricity meters allow customers to check at a glance how much energy they are using and how much it will cost. Turning off appliances that would otherwise be left to run is a simple yet effective way of dramatically cutting electricity bills.

Two years ago MEPs voted in favour of smart meters in a bid to give customers accurate and detailed bills along with information about the environmental impact of their energy use. A recent government announcement to begin trials in the UK has been criticised as a wasted effort by North West MEP Chris Davies.

He said: "Smart meters have been successfully used in other European countries to help people reduce their energy bills. There is no need for the government to carry out trials and instead we should be following the good practice of countries like Italy and getting on with it."

The Liberal Democrat Euro-MP claims the meters would also help to tackle consumer debt.

He said: "A major cause of personal debt in this country is having a huge gas or electricity bill land on your door mat after months or even years of estimated bills, or no bills at all."

"Regular bills based on actual consumption will make a real difference to vulnerable consumers in helping them to save money by cutting their energy use and in stopping the widespread problem of serious debt from unexpectedly large fuel bills."

Average saving from the meters is estimated at around £60 to £80 on the bill of an average household and would save around 233kg of carbon dioxide emissions. This would equate to a national saving of almost £2 billion and 5.6 billion kg of CO2.

According to Energywatch suppliers could benefit from smart meters as they could see major savings on their £1.2 billion annual expenditure on billing, call centres and customer transfers.