Fuel Poverty (Rural Britain)

Lord Barker of Battle Excerpts

Wednesday 7th July 2010 Westminster Hall

[The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change (Gregory Barker)]

I, too, am glad to be serving under your chairmanship for the first time as a Minister in Westminster Hall, Mr Betts. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) on her maiden Westminster Hall speech. She made a fine start in the main Chamber.

It has been a really terrific debate, and I have learnt a lot. It is the first time that I have listened to a fuel poverty debate as a Minister, and it is striking how much cumulative knowledge there is, not just in one party, but on both sides of the House. In the coming months and years of coalition, I hope that we can be inclusive, not only with our coalition partners, but with other parties, because it is clear that concerns about fuel poverty go beyond party boundaries. Although we come from different sides of the political argument, and may have different priorities or apply different principles to problems that lead to different solutions, there is much more common ground on this issue than is often the case. I hope to have an open-door policy and will be open to new ideas from all parties.

We have a radical programme on energy efficiency and we approach it with new vigour and ideas. I appreciate that the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) is new to her job as well and mustard keen to defend the record of the Labour Government, but we all have to wake up and smell the coffee. She asked whether the Government would keep the 2016 target. Keeping targets is not difficult at all, but meeting them is tough. Her Government, whom she defends, were reversing at speed on fuel poverty despite their best efforts. Over 4 million more people—more like 5 million more—are in fuel poverty than in 2004.

Despite good schemes—the hon. Lady rattled off a number of them—the best efforts of Ministers and a great deal of public spending, we are nowhere close to meeting the fuel poverty targets. We have to do some big thinking, ask ourselves some serious questions and redeploy our resources more effectively to deliver for the fuel-poor, particularly for the rural fuel-poor.

My hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal addressed clearly what everyone in the Chamber feels: the rural fuel-poor get overlooked and are part of a forgotten population. Many of the schemes introduced under the previous Government have treated people’s homes in urban areas. However, the rural fuel-poor often get a worse deal, particularly those who are off the gas network, because there is a lack of social tariffs for those who are off the grid. That issue has been a reoccurring theme of the debate. My hon. Friend is right to be concerned that metropolitan-centric, top-down schemes that are not embedded in their local communities do not always deliver.

It is difficult to find many of the rural poor. The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) spoke well and reminded us that it is often more difficult to find and treat fuel-poor homes that are in, or surrounded by, areas of relative prosperity than those that are concentrated in a metropolitan area. That is a challenge and it is why such homes have been harder to treat in the past. However, it does not mean they are any less deserving of support and concern.

I cannot commit the Chancellor to anything, because doing so is way above my pay grade. However, I heard what the hon. Gentleman said about the potential for a green investment bank—the Green Investment Bank Commission published its report last week—and I have taken on board his suggestions. I encourage him to have a dialogue with Ministers to discuss such a function for the GIB. I would welcome that opportunity.

The hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams) gave a very good speech. He focused on concerns about competition and ensuring that reforms of competition in the market drive right across and reach target groups that have, so far, not been helped sufficiently.

I was particularly interested in the ideas mentioned in an intervention about supporting and enhancing local group purchasing schemes. When I go back to the Department, I will ask my officials to consider what we can do in relation to that, because the measure does not necessarily involve a lot of spending. I will consider what we can do to try to support and encourage such schemes, because empowering communities is an aspiration that is shared right across the coalition. If one wants to refer to an ideology, it would not be any of those listed by the hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury. We believe in localism, the need to empower our communities far more and the fact that the solutions to our nation’s problems are not locked in Departments in Whitehall.

I say to the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams) that, of course, we are committed to consultation and best practice, not just with devolved Governments, but with local government and communities. Learning best practice is not a one-way street; there is a great deal more that we can learn from what is successful in communities. Although I am not familiar with the triggers for cold weather payments, I know how important they are. I will look into the problems he mentioned and write to him.

The hon. Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) spoke at length and with great expertise about the extra costs suffered by particularly far-flung areas—not just in his constituency, but in the whole of the British Isles. He focused on partnership-working with devolved Governments, local authorities and communities. I assure him that we are committed to doing that. He also wanted to know what the coalition had to say about off-grid support and protection. The coalition agreement is not a manifesto; it is a relatively tight document. However, he will see that it specifically mentions the need to support and protect off-grid customers. We want to do a lot more.

[Albert Owen]

I hope the hon. Gentleman will not regret offering an open-door policy to Members such as me. He is talking about the coalition and localism, with which I agree. However, there must be more than warm words. Although I agree with the devolution of powers, which I have fought for in referendums for many years, we do not simply need it to happen; we need resources. That is the important thing. Dealing with the issue is not just about passing powers from Whitehall to Cardiff, and to rural areas in Wales; it is about making sure that the resources follow those powers.

[Gregory Barker]

I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s comments, but he will also appreciate that we are in a resource-constrained environment for reasons that we do not need to rehearse here. As well as resources, another factor that empowers communities is knowledge. He made a good point about the need for greater transparency about wholesale and retail prices. I agree with him about that, but we also need greater transparency about billing, tariffs and the costs of switching to a different tariff or the best tariff, or paying by direct debit. Those are all important points.

My hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) brought her medical expertise to bear when she talked about the excessive number of winter deaths. She reminded us of the shocking figures that were published last year and of the impact that poor housing has on not just health outcomes, but life expectancy. That helped to bring the debate into sharp focus.

The hon. Member for Angus (Mr Weir) was right to point out that a minority of the population will always be off-grid and that price is important. He made a crucial point about up-front payments and minimum deliveries. I will consider his ideas on section 10 of the Energy Act 2010. I cannot promise that we will act on them, but we will look at the matter with fresh eyes, because we are interested in radical steps forward and new thinking. As I said, we cannot go on as we are.

We have a big plan of our own: the green deal. It does not involve grants, loans or mortgages and it certainly does not involve the very modest proposals—pilot schemes—that the previous Government introduced. The green deal is a bold, unprecedented scheme that will not involve personal debt, as the pay-as-you-save model of the previous Government did.

[Mr MacNeil]

rose—

[Gregory Barker]

I shall not take interventions, because I am very short on time. The green deal will bring in new capital, new finance providers, new installers and local providers. A constant complaint about Warm Front and its provisions is that it has not empowered local suppliers. The green deal will mean that as long as a local provider can deliver the standards, they can do the work. That will even apply to a village supplier if they get the accreditation, which should be simple and easy to do. I hope that we will see many community enterprises and community partnerships working on the green deal.

The green deal is fundamentally a pay-as-you-save model. We accept that many of those who live in rural homes and some of the most fuel-poor cannot make the savings to justify the significant investment in building infrastructure that is needed; for example, those who have solid wall houses often fall into that category. That is why we intend radically to reform the supplier obligation. We have started doing that with our carbon emissions reduction target extension, where we have increased the amount that we can direct is spent on insulation; if we take into account DIY, it is now 80%. We have stopped the lunacy of mailing or subsidising light bulbs. The green deal is focused on real insulation efforts. We have increased the super-priority group—made up of pensioners, people with children and those from low-income households—from 10% to 15%, so that it is larger than under the Labour consultation. That is really important, but we want to go further.

[Mr MacNeil]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Gregory Barker]

I am afraid that I do not have time.

We want to go further to ensure that support is available. The carbon emissions reduction target will raise more than £1 billion, which is much greater than under the Warm Front programme. Potentially there is a significant amount of revenue, but it needs to be much more focused.

I welcome the thoughts of all hon. Members in the Chamber today about how we should focus on the fuel-poor. We will be considering reforming the supplier obligation, so that there is no hiatus beyond the CERT extension in 2012. There is a new deal—a green deal—and there will be a new supplier obligation. Real, substantial resources will be made available for the long term, and we are absolutely certain that we need to continue to deliver for the fuel-poor.

However, fundamentally, we cannot keep chasing the fuel price and subsidising fossil fuels. We need to spend the money we have on investment in building infrastructure to make homes not only warmer, but cheaper to heat in the long term. We must reduce people’s dependency—whether they are on-grid or off—on gas, coal and oil.

I again congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal on initiating the debate. I am sorry that I have not been able to answer everyone’s questions, but I am sure that this is the first of many Westminster Hall debates on this vital issue.