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LETTER: Concerns about Smart meters

I’ve read so much about the smart meters Hydro is forcing on the taxpayer.

Editor:

I’ve read so much about the smart meters Hydro is forcing on the taxpayer.

Hydro’s reasoning is two-fold according to their spokeswoman: efficiency of reporting usage and because it has become the “global” way of managing hydro usage.

We, the taxpayer, have concerns, and rightly so, with the health issues inherent in these meters which of course Hydro denies outright, as well as the invasion of our privacy, which again Hydro states they will address.

What seems to be forgotten is the real reason for the implementation, which in my opinion is the huge cash grab! Power used during peak periods will be charged at a higher rate than that used at off-peak hours.

Meaning that it will likely cost us more during the hours everyone showers, does laundry and dishes, cooks meals – the most important hours of the day when shops and business are open and we, creatures of habit that we are, are up and about.

If we decided to do all of this at night and sleep during the day, health issues (lack of sunlight) would be even more severe.

My concerns are not only the health, privacy, and financial matters but also issues of globalization and democracy.

Why do we have to mimic other countries’ way of doing things, especially when many of these other countries are in such dire financial straits?

And what of democracy?

Where did our freedoms go, when governments and business can dictate how we live, what we eat and drink, even to lifestyle?

Get with it Canadians!  If you don’t fight for your rights as taxpaying citizens you will lose them!

Hydro reportedly threatens those who refuse the meters.

They will refuse to supply them with hydro!

Don’t we pay for this through one tax or another?

We no longer have choices in even the most mundane areas of our lives and this is not democracy!

I hope Occupy Vancouver and others are only the first step in taking democracy back.

Donna Fildey, Grand Forks