We'll go on destroying cameras, vow activists

To briefly summarise the Part P regs:

You can add one spur to an existing ring socket. You can replace sockets, lighting fixtures and switches with new ones, they don't have to be the same type of fixture. You can re-wire existing installations to replace aged or damaged wiring, provided the exisiting path is followed and the correct parts are used.

You can not insert a new socket into the ring main, only spurs are permitted (I know- it's sheer madness!). You can not do *any* electrical work in a 'hazardous area' which means bathrooms, kitchens and outhouses or garages etc. That means no security lights or patio lighting, unless they are plugged into a socket, ie clbutted as portable equipment. That also means you can no longer change your kitchen or bathroom lighting for nice new halogens yourself.

You can not install electric showers or cookers.

You can not add new ring main circuits to the fuse box

However, you can do all of the 'can nots' if you get it inspected and signed off by a council jobsworth, which will likely cost more than the job itself.

The irony is that even fully qualified electricians who've been in the trade for 40 years can't do this work anymore without having it signed off by some spotty council jobsworth. Unless they are self certified of course (IOW, paid hefty fees to a bunch of extortionists) in which case they can sign off their own work, which kind of defeats the whole point of the exercise IMO.

In any case, what the rules say and what actually happens are rather different. It doesn't appear to be stopping people doing a damn thing and provided one is competent then the authorities will never know. It's one of those unfair laws drafted as a kneejerk reaction to bogus casualty figures which will be widely ignored because it's neither fair, rational nor enforceable.

Dave