PROBLEMS with new LED street lights shining into people's bedrooms became a hot topic on Jeremy Vine's Radio 2 show.

The Adver first covered the complaints caused by the borough council's £6.9 million scheme to replace 28,000 orange street lights with money-saving energy-efficient LED lanterns.

Helena Williams Bowie from Penhill Drive told us about how the brighter lights were affecting her sleep and that of her light-sensitive husband John.

She then discussed the issue live on-air with Jeremy Vine and Coun Maureen Penny live on Radio 2 yesterday.

Helena said: "They were so bright it was like Wembley Stadium. The blackout curtains will be a short-term solution to an ongoing problem."

When Helena posted about her problem on a Facebook community group, she got mixed responses. One person said the lights were 'brighter than the sun' - a phrase Jeremy Vine emphasised throughout the radio segment.

Mr Vine asked Coun Penny if the lights could be dimmed and suggested that everyone misses the old orange lights.

Coun Penny replied: "We dimmed the lights in Mrs Williams Bowie's street last Friday and have undertaken further work yesterday to optimise the brightness so that it's set at a siginficantly lower rate at night time.

"I'm really sorry that she has been experiencing these problems. We have only had two complaints and we were expecting some complaints but it's important that we change over to these LED lights."

Mrs Bowie added: "It's a matter of knowing how to complain. The lights have dimmed a bit but the light is still affecting our house.

"I appreciate that the LED lights are better for the environment in the long-term but they need to be looked at so that they don't hit my bedroom window. Maybe they could be shielded or deflected away."

Coun Penny added that the lights are no brighter than the old orange ones but their light is more directed than before.

She said: "They will bring huge environmental benefits as well as saving tax payers £800,000 a year.

"We spend 3,500 tonnes of CO2 per annum on streetlights and that will now go down significantly."

Listeners from Norfolk, Dorset, Reading, Halifax and Cheshire got in touch with the radio programme to say they had been having similar problems with newly-installed LED lights in their area.

Queries about the new scheme can be submitted through the council’s Report a Problem page, while answers to frequently asked questions can be found on the council’s website at www.swindon.gov.uk/LEDscheme