Smart Meters

Lord Lennie Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Lennie]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made on the roll-out of SMET2 smart meters.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Henley) (Con)]

My Lords, more than 12 million smart meters are operating across Great Britain, with more than 400,000 meters installed every month. As of Sunday 18 November—two days ago—industry information showed that more than 138,000 SMETS 2 meters were connected to the national smart metering network.

[Lord Lennie (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for that response. Yesterday, Which?, the consumers’ champion, published a report that stated that the Government’s £11 billion rollout of smart meters to hard-pressed customers is seriously behind schedule. To meet their target of a smart meter in every household and small business would now require 30 smart meters to be installed every minute of every day between now and the end of 2020. Currently less than one-third of that figure is actually taking place. In addition, the Government’s projected financial benefits to customers have been slashed from £47 a year to less than £1 a month. Can the Minister say what specific actions the Government are taking to both turn around the lamentable rollout performance and restore the projected financial benefits to customers?

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, I am aware of that report but, as I made clear in my original Answer, we are installing more than 400,000 meters every month and that figure is increasing. We are still confident that we will be able to ensure that by the end of 2020 every household in the country will have been offered a meter. That is the aim that we have set out. We are also still confident that we expect to see a net benefit of around £5.7 billion for the entire rollout—benefits for individual consumers as they get greater choice and the advantage of being able to monitor their electricity and therefore keep their bills down, and advantages to the companies themselves.