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“Nick Hurd is aiming to fill the smart meter hero boots”
Despite the howls from opposition MPs and from the industry that getting smart meters into every home by 2020 is becoming an ever more expensive and improbable goal, the government is sticking its head in the sand and sticking to the course.
In a Westminster Hall debate on Tuesday, Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland, Alistair Carmichael, said now, “when there is not much political heat on the subject”, would be the ideal time to consider pushing back the deadline.
He added this would give the industry more time to get its house in order before it starts fitting the technology into those of the public. To top this off, Carmichael said the smart meter programme needs a “hero” to champion it and ensure it obtains the outcomes everyone wants to see.
Aiming to fill the smart meter hero boots is energy and climate change minister Nick Hurd. And like all superheroes on a mission, he will not waiver.
He responded that the 2020 target remains, because changing it now could be seen as the government taking “its foot off the gas” and lead to further delays, thereby pushing consumer benefits further into the future.
He did show a slight chink in his armour though, saying that BEIS will listen to evidence and if, in two or three years’ time, there is a need to push back the deadline, then he will.
It just about leaves the door open to a post-2020 completion for the smart meter rollout, and for Carmichael to tell the government: “I told you so.”
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