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What’s the point of subsidising gas heating that leaks out of every uninsulated roof and wall?
UKGBC slams Prime Minister Liz Truss for failing to announce national insulation programme. Christine Murray reports.
T he UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) has issued a strident statement calling on Prime Minister Liz Truss to announce measures to tackle “leaky” homes and buildings.
“Subsidising gas is not sustainable long term when over a quarter of heat is wasted out of our badly insulated housing and building stock. We’re left with a huge policy gap. If global prices are still high when the immediate support ends, we’ll still be in exactly the same place paying for gas heating that leaks out of every uninsulated roof and wall.”
The UKGBC, which represents more than 700 organisations in the built environment, wrote to both Truss and Rishi Sunak during the leadership campaign to raise awareness of insulating homes as critical to bringing energy bills down long-term.
“The Prime Minister didn’t follow up on her campaigning commitment on this issue and failed to announce any measures to tackle it”
During her leadership campaign, Truss told the Conservative Environment Group that she would “help people insulate their homes”. Yet, while Truss has announced relief on energy bills, new licenses for gas and oil exploration in the North Sea and an end to the national ban on fracking, there’s been no announcement regarding home upgrades to reduce energy waste and increase home generation.
“The Prime Minister didn’t follow up on her campaigning commitment on this issue and failed to announce any measures to tackle it,” reads the statement from the UKGBC’s Director of communications, Policy & Places, Simon McWhirter.
“We need to replace gas boilers with heat pumps, install solar panels, improve insulation and other measures across the country. In fact, with prices so high, a national programme of home and business upgrades could now be cost neutral within a handful of years and save households and businesses many hundreds of pounds year on year.”
The statement comes as soaring energy prices, inflation and a predicted rise in fuel poverty rates support the call to retrofit England’s housing stock. England’s homes are among the worst insulated in Europe. Retrofit rates have seen a precipitous decline over the past decade. The rate of loft and wall insulation installation under government schemes is 95% lower than in 2012.
Investment in home insulation would be cost neutral on the Treasury before the next election, according to analysis from the Energy and Climate Intelligent Unit.
The energy cap announced by Truss will freeze the standing charge at £2,500 per year for two years. The government has said it will pay energy suppliers the difference between the new energy cap and what suppliers would have charged customers. The expected cost of this energy price offset plus the tax cuts, both to be funded by government borrowing, is estimated at £179bn by Deutsche Bank.
A survey by the Office for National Statistics showed that more than four in 10 adults in the UK are already finding it very or somewhat difficult to afford energy bills.
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