Pretty simple really:
Press = cupboard over here. (Kitchen cabinates are usually called presses)
and in the case of an airing cupboard it's hot inside.. hence it's a "hot press"
They are around quite a while, pre-dating electrically heated immersion heaters, old ranges often heated water cylinders that would have been located in a "hotpress" in the kitchen.
Also, our wiring regs have pushed away from mounting the controls in the cupboard itself, due to a risk of over heating, they are now supposed to be flush mounted on the wall outside.
We never had a white meter we just had 2 big massive black siemens meters and a timer that was almost the same size, also siemens, sitting in the middle.. (all sealed by the ESB). The distribution board (consumer unit) would have been much bigger though. Big old diazed unit with maybe 10 fuses.
At least DIN rails & electronnics etc have made things a little neater
The system was and still is called "NightSaver" and had a terribly corny song to advertise it... something along the lines of "sparkling clean dishes and clean dry clothes, night saver's the answer and here's how it goes.." (shudder)
There are also "GoldShield homes". This is an ESB programme to build homes with integrated electric heating (storage for background, local boost heating, under-floor heating, electric showers, electric water heating (often done in a super-insulated tank more like those found in other EU countries than in the UK) and extremely high levels of insulation. The larger homes are sometimes supplied with 380V power for the heating systems.
It was popular but it's not as flexible as gas fired radiator systems and I don't think the ESB is currently encouraging people to opt to use vast amounts of power, at least until the network capacity catches up with the recent explosion in consumption.
