LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
COTTAGERS' LIGHT
SIR,—You published, in October last, an article by Col. Waley Cohen, and a good many letters subsequently, on the supply of electric current to rural districts, which have not told half the story even now. The enormous cost of the transmission installation, which has to be borne by the people wanting a supply, is the whole obstacle. The supply authori- ties, under existing legislation, are only called upon to provide the last 6o feet of any connexion. The cost of the current for lighting is a small matter, if reasonable economy is practised ; cottagers who were paying is. a unit have told me that it has cost them less than oil.
I own a small estate, the hamlet connected with which extends from one mile to a mile and a half from a small country town. There are twenty dwelling houses, eighteen of them with a half mile limit, some within too yards, some 200 or 300 yards, of others. Two of the holdings are more distant, and one farm does not belong to me. In addition there are large farm buildings and a village hall. The little estate was very dilapidated and ill-equipped when I bought it thirty years ago, and I have had to build new cow-houses at four farms.
Pernaps twenty years ago I went into our borough analyst's laboratory, and noticed on a shelf some eight or nine conical glasses containing milk, all showing a considerable sediment at the bottom of the glass. I asked what the sediment was. " Cow-dung," I was told. In view of this know- ledge, it will be understood that, great as are. the advantages and con- venience of electricity to all of us, it.is even more important for the cows. It is not, perhaps, generally realised that the early morning milk is pro- cured during the hours of darkness for at least six months of the year. How in the world are the milking hands to see that the cows' udders are clean with the facilities available? It may be thought that they carry round a hurricane lantern, a poor enough means for the purpose, but, as a matter of fact, I believe that almost invariably the lamp is simply hung on some convenient peg, and gives just enough light to see one cow from another. I do not know what proportion of cow-houses in the country are serviced with electric light, but I imagine that it is very small.
At one of my farms there was an almost derelict mill, with a large water-wheel operating some mill-stones. This farm is half a mile from the boundary of the town. Having ascertained that it would cost £5oo to have the current conveyed to the farm, I decided to put in a turbine, and make my own electricity. This, indeed, cost me more than £500, but the current does a great 'deal more than the lighting of the cow- houses. It lights the whole premises, buildings and house, operates the old mill-stones, runs several farm machines, pumps water from the river to the buildings, and from a well to supply the house. There is no bill for the supply of current, and the cost of upkeep of the turbine and generator is very small. The cow-house is furnished with a flood of light. I wish the milk I drink could come from that farm.
I waited long in the hope that, with the general extension of supply, electricity would become available on less onerous terms, as I had other building operations on hand. There is an 11,000 volt cable going across my heath, 400 yards from the nearest houses in the hamlet, and in 1937 I decided to push enquiries as to the possibilities of getting a supply. It was generally understood that, about that time, supply companies, under Government pressure, had made extensions to a good many large villages in their areas. I asked for an estimate for a supply to the whole of the eighteen houses in the hamlet. The quotation was £710. I interviewed the electricity commissioners, in the hope that they would perhaps exercise some influence, but found that they were entirely on the side of the supply companies. I approached the Central Landowners' Association, of which' I am a member, and also the National Farmers' Union, but they did not betray any interest in the matter.
Now, it is very well known that a great many electricity supply com- panies have been very prosperous for a great many years. Government legislation had not conceived the justice and desirability of bringing the overflowing prosperity of a great many of the companies under contribu- tion for extension of supplies to rural districts. I found, on investigation, that a great many of the companies have paid to their ordinary share- holders what is called a " capital bonus," of an amount reaching, in the case of one company, 220 per cent., and the shareholders have still received large dividends on the non-existent capital. I have had the amount of such capital bonuses, relating to twenty-six English supply companies, taken from the Stock Exchange Year Books, and the approximate total amount is 221 million pounds. It is really much more, for I fmd that the shares of the companies concerned kill stood at a considerable pre- mium in the years following the distribution of these bonuses.
It is very difficult to understand the inertness of the Governmet: Departments concerned. I am not aware that other public utility colt. panies have been allowed such licence. Water companies, I think, ha‘: always been tied to a limited tariff. Gas companies have always had :0 conform to a sliding scale, by which any increase of dividend has to be concurrent with a reduction in the prce of gas. When railways were new, a century ago, and their prospects quite unknown, the Railway Replan Act of 1844 provided that if the companies made sufficient profit to pat dividends of more than to per cent. they had to come bad to Parliameo for revision of their powers. The large sums of money paid out, to the enrichment of electricity interests, cannot, obviously be recovered now But the Government having allowed this to be done, the country, in in opinion, is entitled to claim a very large subsidy for rural electrification
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