COTTAGERS' LIGHT
Sut,—One of the troubles of the electricity industry is the multitude of remedies proposed by those people anxious for its reorganisation. Many -of the proposals come from interested parties, and some from people who feel they have a genuine personal grievance. It is not easy to place Mr. Theodore Stevens, since his contribution to the discussion seems to be rather of the negative kind. His suggestion is that the licence of the undertakers who do not supply electricity throughout the area in which they are authorised to supply it should be deprived of their licence, at least in so far as it concerns the villages suffering by the undertakers' failure. But he does not follow a purely punitive proposal with a constructive suggestion. As I understand the general trend of the argument on the companies' side, their limited tenure under Provisional Orders automatically limits the amount of money which can economically be invested in a supply undertaking. For this reason they cannot adopt a really long-term policy, sinking a very large sum of money in a rural supply undertaking and waiting for an eventual return on the investment. For almost precisely the same reason public authorities with electricity undertakings have confined their enterprises to thickly populated munici- palities. In these circumstances, then, it would be more than' interesting to know who (or what) Mr. Stevens has in mind to replace the dis- possessed companies not at present exercising their rights in certain villages. Can it be that he visualises a philanthropist waiting round the corner to jump in the moment the companies are kicked out? Or does he hope for 'a State subsidy for non-Statutory companies?—Yours faith- Sr Copley Park, Streathatn, S.W. id.
Previous page
