Browse content similar to 20/01/2014. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Welcome to Inside Out from Sutton Look North. Wel | :00:00. | :00:00. | |
Welcome to Inside Out from Sutton Bank in North Yorkshire. | :00:07. | :00:24. | |
Good evening. I'm Toby Foster. Beside me lies the Vale of York and | :00:25. | :00:45. | |
to the east the Vale of Pickering. But soon this beautiful countryside | :00:46. | :00:47. | |
could be covered in fracking bills, to shale gas lies beneath. We | :00:48. | :00:50. | |
investigate claims unregulated fracking could lead to an | :00:51. | :00:51. | |
environmental disaster. Also tonight, we join the | :00:52. | :00:54. | |
investigators trying to track down the energy thieves. | :00:55. | :00:55. | |
It had a fake seal. An oil industry expert has warned | :00:56. | :01:08. | |
Inside Out that unregulated fracking by energy companies could lead to an | :01:09. | :01:12. | |
environment disaster. With hundreds of exploration licences already | :01:13. | :01:14. | |
granted to energy companies and more in the pipeline, Danni Hewson's been | :01:15. | :01:17. | |
looking at this controversial method of extracting shale gas. | :01:18. | :01:29. | |
CHANTING. On the battle ground where environmentalists and big business | :01:30. | :01:39. | |
square up, this is the front line. Shale is important for this country. | :01:40. | :01:47. | |
I can't see a huge shale gas industry developing. Yorkshire isn't | :01:48. | :01:51. | |
Texas. As energy companies prepare to drill | :01:52. | :01:54. | |
across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire who'll be making sure it's safe? | :01:55. | :01:58. | |
Nothing would go ahead if there were environmental dangers. I think | :01:59. | :02:03. | |
people can be reassured by that. You cannot put a price on children's | :02:04. | :02:07. | |
health. It doesn't matter what the money is, unless they are going to | :02:08. | :02:10. | |
do it right, we can't have it, it's too dangerous. | :02:11. | :02:12. | |
All that people have to ask themselves, if the government is | :02:13. | :02:15. | |
having to bribe communities to accept this, something is very | :02:16. | :02:18. | |
wrong. Is the government pushing ahead with | :02:19. | :02:21. | |
fracking at any cost? How can we be sure our water will not be polluted | :02:22. | :02:25. | |
and health affected? And will the mistakes made in the USA be repeated | :02:26. | :02:38. | |
here? Mining companies are lining up to | :02:39. | :02:41. | |
drill the rock thousands of feet beneath us so they can sell the gas | :02:42. | :02:45. | |
that's been locked in there for millions of years. From here in | :02:46. | :02:47. | |
Scarborough on the Yorkshire coast, across the country to here in | :02:48. | :02:51. | |
Blackpool, a band of shale rock as much as a mile deep stretches the | :02:52. | :02:54. | |
width of England thousands of feet beneath us. It's known as the | :02:55. | :02:59. | |
Bowland shale. The 200 licences granted to explore for shale gas in | :03:00. | :03:02. | |
Yorkshire and Lincolnshire so far are seen here in red. The blue area | :03:03. | :03:09. | |
indicates how far that might extend. And this is what all the fuss is | :03:10. | :03:13. | |
about. A geological quirk means this shale at Mam Tor in the Peak | :03:14. | :03:16. | |
District is on the surface rather than deep underground. But exposed | :03:17. | :03:23. | |
to the air, this shale no longer contains gas. The only way of | :03:24. | :03:27. | |
extracting that is by fracking or hydraulic fracturing. Banned in some | :03:28. | :03:30. | |
countries including France, Germany, Bulgaria, Romania, and some states | :03:31. | :03:32. | |
of the US, fracking involves pumping pumping millions of litres of high | :03:33. | :03:35. | |
pressure water and chemical mixture deep underground and extracting the | :03:36. | :03:42. | |
gas from the well. Test drilling for shale gas in | :03:43. | :03:45. | |
Lancashire has been suspended after a small earthquake... | :03:46. | :03:49. | |
But the first time a high pressure fracking procedure was carried out | :03:50. | :03:55. | |
in the UK, it didn't end well. The earthquake triggered by the UK's | :03:56. | :03:58. | |
first foray into fracking effectively stopped the industry in | :03:59. | :04:02. | |
its tracks. But that is all changing. | :04:03. | :04:06. | |
For two decades, Mike Hill has worked on oil and gas rigs all over | :04:07. | :04:10. | |
the world. He has fracked for gas in Africa and was aboard the drilling | :04:11. | :04:14. | |
rig when it caused the earthquake in Blackpool just miles from his home. | :04:15. | :04:16. | |
His subsequent recommendation for a seismic activity warning system has | :04:17. | :04:19. | |
been adopted by the Government. But he says a further 11 safety | :04:20. | :04:22. | |
recommendations he made have been ignored despite three years of | :04:23. | :04:33. | |
lobbying. We are in a situation in the UK where we are going to have | :04:34. | :04:37. | |
unregulated fracking and not only regulated, uninspected and | :04:38. | :04:39. | |
unmonitored. I want fracking done right. And I want it regulated and | :04:40. | :04:42. | |
monitored. If you are not going to do that, you should not be doing it | :04:43. | :04:48. | |
at all. The fracking industry in the United | :04:49. | :04:51. | |
States was exempted from water and air pollution laws in some states. | :04:52. | :04:55. | |
More than a decade after the industry took off in North America, | :04:56. | :04:58. | |
there have been a raft of independent studies into the health | :04:59. | :05:00. | |
implications of living near shale gas sites. In a recent report, | :05:01. | :05:07. | |
independent researchers revealed that the health of new born babies | :05:08. | :05:10. | |
within two miles of fracking sites can be severely compromised. Others | :05:11. | :05:13. | |
directly link fracking chemicals with birth defects as well as | :05:14. | :05:15. | |
neurological and respiratory problems. The film Gasland which | :05:16. | :05:21. | |
shows igniting tap water has been dismissed by some as activist | :05:22. | :05:23. | |
propaganda but independent research by Duke University did find | :05:24. | :05:26. | |
dangerous and combustible levels of methane in drinking water near | :05:27. | :05:34. | |
fracking sites. This directly contradicts the industry's own | :05:35. | :05:37. | |
research. In the UK, there are no specific regulations designed for | :05:38. | :05:40. | |
the shale gas industry. Current ones are 25 years old, and were designed | :05:41. | :05:49. | |
for the offshore industry. There's a number of dangers from fracking. In | :05:50. | :06:00. | |
terms of water contamination, when you frack a well and you pump | :06:01. | :06:03. | |
millions of gallons of chemicals and water at high`pressure, the bulk of | :06:04. | :06:06. | |
that fluid goes into the shale formation. Fracking fluid contains | :06:07. | :06:11. | |
lead at 1500 times the level of safe drinking water, it contains cadmium, | :06:12. | :06:14. | |
radioactive material, and all these things flow back, hopefully, up the | :06:15. | :06:30. | |
centre of the well. However, you have drilled through rocks to get to | :06:31. | :06:33. | |
the shale, you have then linked those shales and all the potential | :06:34. | :06:36. | |
toxic fracking fluid directly to the ground water at the surface. The | :06:37. | :06:39. | |
only thing protecting that water from contamination is the cement | :06:40. | :06:41. | |
around the borehole and around the casings. | :06:42. | :06:50. | |
The Health and Safety Executive is in charge of making sure these wells | :06:51. | :06:54. | |
don't leak. But they don't, in fact, inspect them in person. They will | :06:55. | :06:57. | |
rely on reports from expert examiners who are often employed by | :06:58. | :07:00. | |
the gas companies themselves. But Energy Minister Mikaeel Fallon | :07:01. | :07:03. | |
says the regulatory regime is robust. | :07:04. | :07:08. | |
It says it doesn't have the resources to check each individual | :07:09. | :07:11. | |
well, it would be impossible for them. It's not possible for the | :07:12. | :07:19. | |
Health and Safety Executive to stand and inspect every single factory in | :07:20. | :07:22. | |
this country, or every single chemical plant. The onus of | :07:23. | :07:26. | |
responsibility, rightly, has to be placed on the owner and operator of | :07:27. | :07:31. | |
that site. They must take the legal responsibility for compliance. But I | :07:32. | :07:36. | |
assure you that the Health and Safety Executive have all the | :07:37. | :07:39. | |
resources they need to come in and check it's being done properly. I'm | :07:40. | :07:43. | |
satisfied that the regulatory system we have at the moment is sufficient. | :07:44. | :07:47. | |
We've added new safeguards and I think we've got the balance right. | :07:48. | :07:53. | |
Protecting the environment and the local community but ensuring that | :07:54. | :08:01. | |
the burden of regulation is not so oppressive that it stops any kind of | :08:02. | :08:07. | |
exploration, which some people who are explored `` opposed shale gas | :08:08. | :08:18. | |
would want to do. The other main regulatory body is | :08:19. | :08:21. | |
the Environment Agency. It's in charge of ensuring the toxic water | :08:22. | :08:24. | |
that flows back is disposed of safely. Having lost 1,500 jobs, | :08:25. | :08:27. | |
there are doubts it has the expertise or manpower to regulate | :08:28. | :08:29. | |
effectively. Questions remain about how millions of litres of water with | :08:30. | :08:32. | |
radioactive contamination would be dealt with. The EA is also supposed | :08:33. | :08:39. | |
to monitor abandoned wells. They are totally clueless when it comes to | :08:40. | :08:42. | |
what happens to a well after it has been abandoned. All the equipment, | :08:43. | :08:47. | |
the instrumentation and hardware that is used to drill wells, they do | :08:48. | :08:54. | |
not have that equipment. They are not monitoring these wells, they are | :08:55. | :09:01. | |
just being left. The key work they do in protecting the environment, I | :09:02. | :09:12. | |
can assure you that there `` that there is no risk of contamination of | :09:13. | :09:15. | |
water supply and that any waste involved has two be properly | :09:16. | :09:19. | |
disposed of. These are legally binding requirements. | :09:20. | :09:29. | |
This is Kirby Misperton in North Yorkshire. Test ruling has been | :09:30. | :09:41. | |
carried out here. Screened by those trees just behind me is the site of | :09:42. | :09:44. | |
test drilling carried out by Viking Gas last October. Officially, the | :09:45. | :09:47. | |
company says it has no interest in shale gas. But its own planning | :09:48. | :09:50. | |
application appears to contradict that as it specifically targets the | :09:51. | :09:53. | |
Bowland shale. Viking Gas wouldn't give an interview but did eventually | :09:54. | :09:55. | |
concede it is now analysing shale samples with a view to further | :09:56. | :10:00. | |
drilling. A mile away, Lendales Farm produces beef cattle. It's been run | :10:01. | :10:03. | |
by the same family for three generations. If they could prove 100 | :10:04. | :10:12. | |
per cent that it was safe, yes, I would approve of it. Our animals in | :10:13. | :10:19. | |
the summer drink from the river and if it gets into the water courses, | :10:20. | :10:23. | |
it could affect the drinking water. This is why farmers have to adhere | :10:24. | :10:26. | |
to stringent rules so we don't affect the water courses and I think | :10:27. | :10:29. | |
the fracking companies should do the same. You would hope the council | :10:30. | :10:39. | |
would be on board. And they would be monitoring it with the environment | :10:40. | :10:42. | |
agency. Whether that is going to happen, we do not know. No`one from | :10:43. | :10:48. | |
North Yorkshire County Council would give us an interview, but the | :10:49. | :10:51. | |
council leader did tell Inside Out that there was no official policy on | :10:52. | :10:54. | |
fracking and that each application would be considered on its merits. | :10:55. | :10:59. | |
We are announcing that the local council should keep 100% of the | :11:00. | :11:04. | |
business rates. Some have dismissed as bribery the Government's new | :11:05. | :11:08. | |
incentives for councils. In York, there are currently three licence | :11:09. | :11:11. | |
blocks owned by Dart Energy who have indicated their intention to apply | :11:12. | :11:17. | |
for exploratory drilling permits. We do not know what effect it has on | :11:18. | :11:22. | |
seismic activity in a heritage city. We do not know what it does to the | :11:23. | :11:32. | |
water supply. The evidence of an water supply. The evidence of an | :11:33. | :11:33. | |
energy panacea does not seem to be there. I take with a pinch of salt | :11:34. | :11:35. | |
the idea that we can take business rates. What is the difference | :11:36. | :11:43. | |
between fracking and the forms of renewable energy and can we keep | :11:44. | :11:49. | |
those business rates? I can understand people being against | :11:50. | :11:52. | |
fracking, but planning departments are finding it difficult to find | :11:53. | :12:03. | |
ways of upholding the policy. The pad is built, the well is drilled, | :12:04. | :12:06. | |
the equipment is on and the operator is ready to frack. It would be a | :12:07. | :12:10. | |
very brave council that then says, "No. You have gone that far, now | :12:11. | :12:14. | |
stop, we are not letting you go any further." Because you can be sure | :12:15. | :12:16. | |
that operator immediately appeals to the Secretary of State and you can | :12:17. | :12:20. | |
be sure that that decision is immediately overturned. The prospect | :12:21. | :12:22. | |
of lower gas bills has been dismissed by some ministers and even | :12:23. | :12:25. | |
by the Government's key adviser, Lord Browne, also chairman of | :12:26. | :12:31. | |
fracking company Cuadrilla. It could bring 74,000 jobs, over ?3 billion | :12:32. | :12:35. | |
of investment. And there is scepticism about how many jobs would | :12:36. | :12:40. | |
be created by a shale gas industry in the UK. Mike Hill says that once | :12:41. | :12:45. | |
the Wells are up and running, most of the work is automated. You need a | :12:46. | :12:51. | |
maximum of 50 guys to work 3,000 plus wells, C rollicking long`term | :12:52. | :12:58. | |
at a small number of jobs. `` so you are looking at. The British | :12:59. | :13:02. | |
Geological Survey was asked by the Government to estimate the extent of | :13:03. | :13:05. | |
the Bowland shale and calculated a figure of 1,300 trillion cubic | :13:06. | :13:07. | |
metres, but despite that, they doubt whether the industry is viable in | :13:08. | :13:12. | |
this country. We shouldn't be distracted by this enormous figure. | :13:13. | :13:16. | |
We might be lucky to get 1% out, we might get 0%. We have to be | :13:17. | :13:20. | |
realistic about this. It is quite hard to imagine, you know, a big | :13:21. | :13:24. | |
shale gas industry in a country so densely populated ` more so full of | :13:25. | :13:27. | |
people who love their landscape and who value it. Across the Pennines, | :13:28. | :13:34. | |
the IGas compound at Barton Moss, near Salford, is effectively | :13:35. | :13:36. | |
besieged by the protestors camped outside. This convoy of lorries is | :13:37. | :13:43. | |
just a few hundred yards from the expoloratory drilling site. That | :13:44. | :13:46. | |
short distance will take over an hour. Keep walking. As long as they | :13:47. | :13:53. | |
keep moving, this obstruction is not illegal, and for the protestors, it | :13:54. | :13:56. | |
is the ideal way of making even the search for gas as difficult as | :13:57. | :14:02. | |
possible. They waste eight million gallons of water per well. 3,000 | :14:03. | :14:10. | |
Wells, that is a lot of water. The lorries pass what has become a | :14:11. | :14:12. | |
permanent protest camp, attracting campaigners from all over the | :14:13. | :14:16. | |
country. They have been buoyed by the success of a similar protest in | :14:17. | :14:19. | |
Balcombe, in Sussex, which stopped fracking operations. They see that | :14:20. | :14:24. | |
battle as a template for stopping a whole industry in its tracks. It is | :14:25. | :14:28. | |
not just the camps, it is all the local people. In Balcombe, the local | :14:29. | :14:33. | |
residents did an amazing job. They were just challenging the | :14:34. | :14:36. | |
Environment Agency permits and just challenging the whole process. | :14:37. | :14:40. | |
Inside the compound, there is little activity today, despite the protests | :14:41. | :14:46. | |
outside. Looking around, I mean, it is like an army camp in enemy | :14:47. | :14:52. | |
territory. Can it ever be worth it? This is the first time we have ever | :14:53. | :14:56. | |
had to resort to putting up some security around it of this sort, | :14:57. | :14:58. | |
this order of magnitude, and that has been because of some of the | :14:59. | :15:02. | |
activities of people who have a legitimate right to protest to the | :15:03. | :15:06. | |
idea of fracking. But at the moment, IGas isn't even fracking on | :15:07. | :15:13. | |
this site. It can only do so after a further planning application. We | :15:14. | :15:18. | |
believe that it is worth pursuing this, because it has got an enormous | :15:19. | :15:21. | |
benefit not just for the country as a whole, in terms of energy | :15:22. | :15:24. | |
security, but for the region, in terms of jobs, training, employment | :15:25. | :15:31. | |
and everything that goes with it. People are worried that their water | :15:32. | :15:37. | |
is going to be contaminated. Should they be worried? There has been | :15:38. | :15:40. | |
evidence of some contamination, but that has been caused because the | :15:41. | :15:42. | |
well has not been constructed properly. There is absolutely no | :15:43. | :15:47. | |
evidence that it has been caused by fracking per se. In terms of the | :15:48. | :15:52. | |
water specifically, we do our own baseline monitoring of that, | :15:53. | :15:54. | |
pre`arriving on site, during and post. Many believe independent | :15:55. | :16:00. | |
testing is the only way to hold energy companies to account over | :16:01. | :16:05. | |
water contamination. To that end, the British Geological Survey is | :16:06. | :16:08. | |
conducting its own tests on water supplies across the country in | :16:09. | :16:10. | |
advance of any shale gas extraction. These tests on the North | :16:11. | :16:15. | |
York Moors will establish methane levels before any fracking is | :16:16. | :16:22. | |
carried out. I have no issue with fracking going ahead, but not going | :16:23. | :16:26. | |
ahead unregulated. It has to be controlled, it has to be monitored, | :16:27. | :16:30. | |
it has to be inspected. Otherwise the risks to the public and the | :16:31. | :16:34. | |
environment are very severe. It is an absurd situation to be in. It is | :16:35. | :16:37. | |
a situation where the industry is more pro`regulation than the | :16:38. | :16:42. | |
Government. The industry is less pro`fracking than the Government. It | :16:43. | :16:47. | |
is a completely weird and absurd situation to be in, but that is the | :16:48. | :16:51. | |
situation we are presently in. So it is dangerous. It is dangerous for | :16:52. | :16:54. | |
the public in Yorkshire and, indeed, across the UK. Because if we get | :16:55. | :16:58. | |
fracking by stealth, we also don't get any regulations either. People | :16:59. | :17:02. | |
get concerned about whether we should be burning gas and what about | :17:03. | :17:07. | |
renewables? The reality is we need energy and we need various types of | :17:08. | :17:10. | |
energy and gas is much cleaner than coal and gas is a way of, as we | :17:11. | :17:14. | |
continue to grow the renewable side of things, it can be part of the | :17:15. | :17:21. | |
overall energy mix. The Government wants the fracking industry to | :17:22. | :17:27. | |
succeed in this country. Those who oppose it have a massive fight on | :17:28. | :17:29. | |
their hands to stop it. If you have any views on fracking or | :17:30. | :17:41. | |
know about a story we should be covering, please contact us on | :17:42. | :17:42. | |
Facebook or Twitter. Now, whilst fracking is being touted | :17:43. | :17:51. | |
as a solution to sky`high energy prices, in the meantime, most of us | :17:52. | :17:55. | |
are just trying to find clever ways of keeping our bills down. Some, | :17:56. | :18:01. | |
however, are taking matters into their own hands and stealing gas and | :18:02. | :18:06. | |
electricity. Mark Jordan has been finding out more. | :18:07. | :18:10. | |
Energy prices are making headlines, as our bills hit an all`time high. | :18:11. | :18:17. | |
Honest households pay up, but ?30 a year of our bill is paying for | :18:18. | :18:22. | |
stolen power. The meter has definitely been interfered with, | :18:23. | :18:25. | |
because it has a fake seal in the top. This is the story of the power | :18:26. | :18:30. | |
thieves and the people who track them down. | :18:31. | :18:34. | |
The British Gas training academy in Leicester. Here, engineers learn how | :18:35. | :18:40. | |
to spot tampering of gas and electric supply. It has never been | :18:41. | :18:46. | |
more needed. A difficult economic climate and more people feeling that | :18:47. | :18:49. | |
this is the only way that they can get their energy. I think the trend | :18:50. | :18:55. | |
is upwards. This is a huge problem and we believe perhaps that ?500 | :18:56. | :18:58. | |
million worth of gas and electricity is stolen across the industry across | :18:59. | :19:02. | |
the year. In terms of what that means for a customer, potentially | :19:03. | :19:05. | |
?30 a year on their bills, it is a lot of money for our customers and | :19:06. | :19:08. | |
money that they shouldn't have to pay. For the next few days, I am | :19:09. | :19:14. | |
riding along with Piers and Malcolm, power theft investigators. The most | :19:15. | :19:19. | |
bizarre case that I think I have dealt with is probably a nursing | :19:20. | :19:22. | |
home. And when we caught him, it cost him ?25,000. But this | :19:23. | :19:26. | |
morning's call is for much smaller fry. The first three we have got are | :19:27. | :19:32. | |
domestic. A routine meter reading on an east London estate has discovered | :19:33. | :19:35. | |
a single mother of three tampering with here gas meter. There was what | :19:36. | :19:41. | |
appears to be a cooker hose at the time that actually had replaced that | :19:42. | :19:46. | |
gas meter. Even with gas central heating, they only paid ?15 last | :19:47. | :19:52. | |
year. How many people live in the property? My mum, my two sisters and | :19:53. | :19:59. | |
myself. The meter is back but hasn't been installed correctly. Because | :20:00. | :20:02. | |
the mother has children, she is considered vulnerable and cannot be | :20:03. | :20:06. | |
cut off. Potentially, this one will go to the police and we try to trace | :20:07. | :20:11. | |
back who is doing this. We do find trends of where people are going | :20:12. | :20:14. | |
around estates and tampering with the same meters in the same way. | :20:15. | :20:18. | |
These people will charge a range, we have heard, from ?10 up to ?500 a | :20:19. | :20:22. | |
time. So they can do 10`15 a day. They are not putting themselves at | :20:23. | :20:25. | |
risk. If something happened there, it is all the adjoining properties | :20:26. | :20:28. | |
and everyone in there who is going to be affected by a potential | :20:29. | :20:31. | |
explosion. NEWS REPORTER: This was the scene | :20:32. | :20:35. | |
that people on Dundas Road worker to this morning. Whatever the cause, | :20:36. | :20:40. | |
gas explosions can be deadly. REPORTER: a suspected gas explosion | :20:41. | :20:44. | |
inside a terraced house. In Sheffield last year, this entire | :20:45. | :20:48. | |
terraced house was blown apart. Miraculously, no one died but it is | :20:49. | :20:51. | |
a chilling reminder of the dangers of gas. The damage of that explosion | :20:52. | :20:57. | |
was so great that authorities were never able to pinpoint the exact | :20:58. | :21:01. | |
cause. Emergency services were worried about other dangers, so they | :21:02. | :21:09. | |
decided to conduct a Test. The police were on site and the networks | :21:10. | :21:12. | |
were on site. And they asked us whether or not we felt it was right | :21:13. | :21:16. | |
to have a look at some of the other supplies in the street. And, yes, | :21:17. | :21:20. | |
from looking at about 20 houses in a single terraced street, sure | :21:21. | :21:23. | |
enough, we found five gas thefts and two electricity thefts. That's a | :21:24. | :21:30. | |
great example of what the scale of the issue is. | :21:31. | :21:33. | |
Little now shocks Mark. He has seen all sorts of dangerous ways of | :21:34. | :21:41. | |
stealing power. This is one that really impacts on safety. A bicycle | :21:42. | :21:44. | |
inner tube and they have used it to bridge the gas meter, so instead of | :21:45. | :21:48. | |
the gas meter being here, this tube would literally be across here like | :21:49. | :21:49. | |
that. Hello. We have come here to inspect | :21:50. | :21:56. | |
the electricity meter, OK? We've got a bypass on the electric meter. This | :21:57. | :22:00. | |
flat's total bill of just ?5 for last year led them to find this | :22:01. | :22:08. | |
dangerous bypass. Tell me what's the problem is. Malcolm produces | :22:09. | :22:11. | |
evidence for prosecution and the bill for years of stolen | :22:12. | :22:18. | |
electricity. It is actually back`billed since 2008, when you can | :22:19. | :22:24. | |
start it. `` from when the account started. It is going to be a big | :22:25. | :22:28. | |
bill. It will be, yeah. Hard times may drive some, but we are now in a | :22:29. | :22:32. | |
very rich part of Essex. Homes here often sell for over a million, but | :22:33. | :22:36. | |
the team have a tip`off about an eight`bed bit mansion with ?300,000 | :22:37. | :22:40. | |
worth of cars on the forecourt. But the house is suspiciously | :22:41. | :22:45. | |
energy`efficient. Can I come in and just have a look at what you got? | :22:46. | :22:50. | |
Thank you. Where is the light switch for this | :22:51. | :22:56. | |
room here? Within minutes of the team's arrival, the power to most of | :22:57. | :23:02. | |
the house mysteriously goes off. My suspicion is that all the back of | :23:03. | :23:05. | |
the house and that garage is on a meter supply that is now switched | :23:06. | :23:13. | |
off. But where to look for the illegal supply? I'm just looking to | :23:14. | :23:19. | |
see if any of it has been taken up. The owners insist the only meters | :23:20. | :23:22. | |
are the ones outside, but an hour and a half into the search, Piers | :23:23. | :23:30. | |
finds another supply. I can see the pipe. Ah. Another electricity meter. | :23:31. | :23:38. | |
Moments later... OK. There we have another gas meter. All the power, be | :23:39. | :23:43. | |
it gas or electricity, used through these two meters, is not being | :23:44. | :23:46. | |
billed, it appears. So they are getting it for free. For now. But | :23:47. | :23:53. | |
very soon, it is a mansion without power. The illegal supply is cut | :23:54. | :23:58. | |
off. It won't be restored until an estimated ?6,000 of stolen energy is | :23:59. | :24:03. | |
paid for. These people can quite obviously afford to pay for all | :24:04. | :24:05. | |
their energy and yet they are not. Theft is being made all the easier | :24:06. | :24:17. | |
by the internet. MAN: "There you go, it is going slow now." Video guides | :24:18. | :24:22. | |
on stealing energy. A new local scam can go global in days. | :24:23. | :24:29. | |
It is a cat and mouse game. Close one scam and another quickly opens. | :24:30. | :24:35. | |
The latest comes from Chinese community newspapers. They openly | :24:36. | :24:38. | |
advertise telephone numbers for someone to come round and meddle | :24:39. | :24:46. | |
with your meter. TRANSLATIONS: Take control of your | :24:47. | :24:49. | |
meters with this super money`saving device. Especially suitable for | :24:50. | :24:55. | |
takeaways, restaurants and houses. That Chinese scam has now spread | :24:56. | :25:00. | |
across Britain. We are from British Gas, we have come to inspect the gas | :25:01. | :25:06. | |
mete, if we can. Piers and Malcolm think they have found it in this | :25:07. | :25:11. | |
fish and chip shop. Just put something on that is using the gas. | :25:12. | :25:15. | |
That is good. It doesn't seem to be moving. We are going to take that | :25:16. | :25:18. | |
meter and leave you off supply, so cutting off the gas. Piers soon | :25:19. | :25:21. | |
unravels the crude scam from China that is being uncovered in | :25:22. | :25:25. | |
restaurants across Britain. OK, remove that and I'm now going to | :25:26. | :25:29. | |
remove the index mechanism. He then exposes the cogs that drive the | :25:30. | :25:33. | |
meter mechanism. It is the moment of truth. I don't know if you can see | :25:34. | :25:40. | |
that. It has got teeth that have been taken off. Cut off half the | :25:41. | :25:46. | |
teeth, and you halve the bill. This one has just a single tooth left. So | :25:47. | :25:50. | |
only a fraction of the gas has been recorded on that index. And you | :25:51. | :25:53. | |
still don't know anything about it? You don't know when that happened or | :25:54. | :25:57. | |
who could've done it? Meanwhile, Malcolm produces an estimated bill. | :25:58. | :26:01. | |
It is ?1,782.10 for the past four months. Can you pay that now? | :26:02. | :26:08. | |
Otherwise I have got to tell the engineers to make sure that supply | :26:09. | :26:12. | |
is kept off and we will walk away with the meter. It sounds tough, but | :26:13. | :26:18. | |
they can only charge for the few months he has been with British Gas. | :26:19. | :26:21. | |
This former Merseyside detective warns that thieves, like good | :26:22. | :26:26. | |
consumers, keep changing supplier. You can just change supplier very | :26:27. | :26:30. | |
easily, as it is now, if you get caught extracting electricity from | :26:31. | :26:32. | |
one company, you can leave and then go to another one. This is a | :26:33. | :26:41. | |
problem. If you say to them, right, there is ?1 million of electricity | :26:42. | :26:43. | |
extracted from the company, their profits and income will be exactly | :26:44. | :26:46. | |
the same, because that ?1 million loss will be spread over all of the | :26:47. | :26:49. | |
honest bill`paying customers, so they have lost nothing. Back at the | :26:50. | :26:58. | |
chip shop, the owner's credit card means this is one bill we won't be | :26:59. | :27:01. | |
picking up. Immunity from prosecution is not included. | :27:02. | :27:08. | |
There is one area of power theft where police, not power companies, | :27:09. | :27:13. | |
take the lead. Step away from the door. Nationwide, police uncover | :27:14. | :27:21. | |
over 20 cannabis farms a day. Most are stealing their electricity. | :27:22. | :27:28. | |
Essex police raid up to six a week. It is thought a third of the | :27:29. | :27:31. | |
electricity stolen in Britain goes on cannabis farms. | :27:32. | :27:35. | |
So they followed the wires all around the house and they think that | :27:36. | :27:38. | |
this electricity is being stolen from the neighbours. You can see | :27:39. | :27:43. | |
there is a power cable, that is power that is coming from next door, | :27:44. | :27:46. | |
so they have taken the power from next door. Police are now under | :27:47. | :27:51. | |
orders to destroy everything that makes growing cannabis possible. | :27:52. | :27:56. | |
Power theft, whether on cannabis farms or in the chip shop, it is | :27:57. | :27:59. | |
booming, and unless detected, we get the bill. A total invoice amount is | :28:00. | :28:10. | |
?7,702 .88. Catching the thieves is costly. Few will ever see prison. | :28:11. | :28:15. | |
Here, cheeky enough to ask for a discount. We don't offer a discount. | :28:16. | :28:21. | |
It seems just too much. OK, do you want to get the electrician in? The | :28:22. | :28:26. | |
lights may go out, but the bill is still on us. Pop the electricity | :28:27. | :28:28. | |
off, OK? Well, that is all for tonight here | :28:29. | :28:36. | |
at Sutton Bank. Make sure you join us next week... | :28:37. | :28:38. | |
When we will be investigating claims of abuse at a youth detention | :28:39. | :28:41. | |
centre. Looking And the effects of so`called | :28:42. | :28:45. | |
legal highs. And finding out what happened to the | :28:46. | :28:49. | |
Bradford car company that was once a world beater. | :28:50. | :28:50. |