It’s energy theft and it’s a crime - section 13 of the Theft Act 1968. It’s a huge problem in the UK and all our bills are higher to accommodate those who do it.
The ‘electricity should be free’ idea is a weird one. It doesn’t ‘come from the earth’. Electricity has to be generated (wind, coal, nuclear whatever), safely transported (pylons, wires etc) and safely distributed to homes - that’s why we see those substations because they reduce the voltage to make it safer before it’s delivered to homes.
What seems to be being suggested, is just circumnavigating a complicated system… eg because we have different energy providers, the national grid etc.
So, by installing a meter yourself (legal, if you have the correct person do it), pretending you have moved (not really legit) and not answering any further enquiries, you get out of paying for it… Which sounds like fraud, funnily enough… If you do move house at some point, you may well run in to future problems too…
It’s probably ‘clever’, if you can be bothered ignoring letters, people at your door asking questions, fending off potential debt collectors etc., and also the niggling worry it might catch up with you, and it’s a prisonable offence.
The earth cable is a safety feature - in case of any electrical faults or surges it provides a low resistance path to the ground, otherwise the electricity wouldn’t have anywhere to go and if someone touched the faulty appliance or wire or whatever, they would have the full force of that electricity and possibly die. What it isn’t doing is ‘sucking up energy from the ground’ which is what seems to be the basis of this weird ‘energy is free’ idea. (My partner has a background in electrics and laughed his head off when I told him this)
It all sounds rather exhausting, and also unsafe - it’s a regulated industry - when the reps come to check your meters they are also able to assess for any obvious safety issues. I wouldn’t want to mess around with either electricity or gas, and it’s bizarre that people do…