Surely the Distributors own the meters? Otherwise the meter ownership will have to be transferred every time I change retailer (which might be quite a bit from now on).
Also, when my Gas meter wasn't on the distribuor's data base (Jemena) it was up to them to sort it out, not AGL. As I understand things, it the "Billing rights" that become the property of the retailer, not the meter. Furthermore, it would then be each retailer's job to read their own meters, so there might be ten readers reading 10% each of the meters in each street - drastically inefficient.