Britain’s Glow Problem: MPs Debate Wireless Interference

When Neon Crashed the Airwaves

On paper it reads like satire: on the eve of the Second World War, MPs in Westminster were arguing about neon signs.

Gallacher, never one to mince words, demanded answers from the Postmaster-General. How many complaints had rolled in about wireless sets being ruined by neon signage?

The answer was astonishing for the time: around a thousand complaints in 1938 alone.

Imagine it: the soundtrack of Britain in 1938, interrupted not by enemy bombers but by shopfront glow.

Major Tryon confessed the problem was real. The difficulty?: the government had no legal power to force neon owners to fix it.

He spoke of a possible new Wireless Telegraphy Bill, but admitted consultations would take "some time".

Translation? Parliament was stalling.

The MP wasn’t satisfied. People were paying licence fees, he argued, neon signs London and they deserved a clear signal.

Another MP raised the stakes. What about the Central Electricity Board and their high-tension cables?

The Postmaster-General ducked the blow, basically admitting the whole electrical age was interfering with itself.

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Looking back now, this debate is almost poetic. Back then, personalised neon signs London was the tech menace keeping people up at night.

Fast forward to today and it’s the opposite story: the once-feared glow is now the heritage art form begging for protection.

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Why does it matter?

Neon has never been neutral. It’s always forced society to decide what kind of light it wants.

In truth, it’s been art all along.

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Here’s the kicker. When we look at that 1939 Hansard record, we don’t just see dusty MPs moaning about static.

That old debate shows neon has always mattered. And it still does.

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Ignore the buzzwords of "LED neon". Real neon has been debated in Parliament for nearly a century.

If neon could shake Westminster before the war, it can certainly shake your walls now.

Choose the real thing.

Smithers has it.

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