Madam,

Shock! Horror! The £11 billion project to switch to so-called Smart Meters and which will cost every household £420 (that’s you and me) has been found wanting.

Just think what £11bn would do for other services such as the NHS.

The UK Government, from Margaret Thatcher onward, has also shot itself in the foot in privatising the power industry.

It beggars belief that the government now advises us to change energy companies to save on bills when smart meters are not even compatible between the various energy companies – “That’s another fine mess you have got me into,” as Oliver Hardy would have said – previous Secretaries of State for Energy and Climate Change such as Chris Huhne, Edward Davey and Amber Rudd have a lot to answer for. Indeed, Amber Rudd read history at Edinburgh University, so is it such a surprise the energy companies are in such an unbelievable mess?

Surely even the most neuron-challenged person will recognise that it is far cheaper to power a five-watt LED lamp bulb than say, a 3,000-watt electric fire – to be sure, for the same period of use as the electric fire you could power 600 LED lamp bulbs for the same cost – it’s not rocket science, so who needs a smart meter?

Disturbingly, this is only the tip of the iceberg as smart meters not only lend themselves to imaginative and exploitative billing, but worryingly will have the potential to isolate a customer or group of customers from a remote computer – currently disconnection requires a visit by an engineer.

They say every cloud has a silver lining and in this case the lucky bunnies are the exploitative power companies, as they simply pass on the cost to the hapless customer – heads they win, tails we lose – like taking candy from a baby.

Yours etc,

Dave Haskell, Cardigan.

Have your say on the local issues affecting you - email [email protected] or join in the conversation on our Facebook page