ABSTRACT
This chapter describes how the electricity industry developed so that we can more easily understand the differences between the old nationalised industry and the current privatised one; and explains why we must from now on talk about licence-holders and not electricity companies. It illustrates who owns and runs what and in respect of which region. The aim of the original legislation, the Electric Lighting Act 1882, is to facilitate and regulate the supply of electricity for lighting in Great Britain and Ireland. The two main aims of privatisation of the electricity industry were to allow competition between suppliers of electricity and to allow new generators to connect to the system. So far as the public was concerned the face of the electricity industry in the era of nationalisation would have been the Area Electricity Boards. The responsibility of the distribution network operator ends at the cut out position which is normally immediately prior to the electricity meters.
