Why not extend the cash for cars scheme to include washing machines: ask the major UK high street retail chains.

August 20th, 2009 by tom | Filed under Uncategorized.

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In a move that might be totally brazen or financially brilliant, retailers in the UK have called on Business Secretary Peter Mandelson to extend the cash for clunkers scheme to the "white goods" industry. The initiative, sponsored by the British Retail Consortium (BRA), would like to see families be given proportionally similar cash incentives that will allow British families to scrap their electricity guzzling household appliances which will not only be less problematic but also friendlier for the environment.

The BRA has suggested that the subsidies be applied to such day to day household electric appliances such as washing machines, driers, fridges and freezers. To add weight to their argument the BRA announced that in the UK today there are more than 15 million fridges, freezers and washing machines that were purchased in the 1990s and by doing away with them, carbon dioxide emissions could be reduced by almost one and half million tons a year by the end of the next decade. The list of logical advantages for backing the initiative is long and considerable, but there is one major stumbling block to the argument.

Most of the consumer electrical goods are manufactured outside of the UK, meaning that the initiative would be useless for the manufacturing sector. That explains why the initiative for the "cash for electrical goods" comes from the retailing sector, saying that not only would it help Britain get greener but it would also provide the pressure to give the electrical retailing sector a much needed boost after almost two years of financial instability.

The BRA calculates the reform would cost the UK Treasury slightly over £500 million a year, for at least the next two years.