An enlightening tale on the stupidity of Government intervention

The history of Government is paved with good intentions, only for its actions in the most part to have unforeseen and harmful consequences. There’s a wonderful story in today’s Telegraph about the implementation of the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target. It has all the hallmarks of a Thick of It or Yes Minister script.

Hundreds of millions of old-fashioned low energy lightbulbs have been mailed to British families that often cannot use them, official documents show.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change admits that it is "concerned" at the mailings – described yesterday by campaigners as a waste – and has agreed to ban them.

But it has decided not so do so for another six months to allow even more of the bulbs to be sent out - even though every home in the country has already, on average, received at least eight of them.

Experts believe that vast numbers of the compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) bulb are stored away, never to be used, and thrown out to end up in landfill, where they pose a potential pollution problem.

Light manufacturers retailers are worried that potential customers will be discouraged from buying their products.

The bulbs have been distributed by gas and electricity companies as a cheap way of meeting a Government obligation to help their customers save energy, under an official scheme called the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target.

The idea was that the companies would subsidize households - especially "low-income, vulnerable or elderly" ones – to save energy by measures like installing loft and cavity wall insulation.

But the Department admits that about a third of the companies efforts have instead bought up and sent out the cheap bulbs, in the hope that householders might use them.

But it adds that these have overwhelmingly been the most old fashioned and ugly "stick-type" CFLs, hated by many people, and that they have often had screw fittings that cannot be used in the bayonet sockets found in most British homes.

It reports that "around 200 million" of the "unsolicited" bulbs have so far been sent out under the scheme.

There is a lesson here. We have a very effective system of distributing goods in the most efficient and sustainable way. It’s called the market. We shouldn’t tamper with it.