Avoiding fuel poverty

It was very informative on the grants and assistance available to those already in the position of spending more than 10% of their disposable income on heating and will be important to those who are fast approaching the same situation. It was also a good example of central government provision being used by partnerships of local government and other local agencies. It remains now, for us who attended, to ensure that the information reaches those who really need it.

Some of the assistance available is for better insulation of homes and some of it is available via the energy companies. The added benefit in this is of course that with better insulated homes there is a reduction in carbon emissions.

Liberal Democrats believe that there is more that could be done.

We would place a greater duty on the energy companies. The companies would be required to pay for better insulation measures from the estimated 9billion windfall that they are receiving from the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). This move is also backed by Ofgem. Currently, under the E T S the vast majority of permits to produce carbon dioxide are being given away free. Although the permits restrict the amount of CO2 produced they have an intrinsic value and effectively give the companies a windfall profit when they produce energy at an increased price.

Liberal Democrats also agree that the most vulnerable customers should not be penalised because they pay for their energy through prepayment meter tariffs. It is unfair that those who are not able to pay by direct debit should pay an annual bill as much as 52 for electricity and 92 for gas more, than those who do. Nationally about a quarter of those in fuel poverty are on prepayment meters. British Gas has started the process to establish a social tariff for its most vulnerable customers but Liberal Democrats believe it could be better.

There is a need for the home insulation programme to be speeded up. This could be in the hands of our local authority. The LGA has calculated that the cost of adequately insulating all walls and lofts will be around 5bn. They have proposed, through scaling up of the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERT), the Government should aim to ensure all houses are adequately insulated through a 10 year programme.

Kirklees Council, where a quarter of the population is affected by fuel poverty is already rolling out a suitable programme. Here in Bexhill and Battle we have the highest proportion of the over 80's and the second highest proportion of over 65's. As we live longer these proportions are also set to rise and amongst those numbers are likely to be an increasing number falling in to fuel poverty and with that comes a possible increase in the number of excess winter deaths.

So well done Rother for hosting the workshop but ways and means have to be found to ensure there is real substance behind all of the measures.