Energy Company Obligation Schemes

Tim Farron Excerpts

Tuesday 27th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I congratulate the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake) on securing the debate and making an excellent and detailed opening speech. I also pay tribute to the other contributors, who have spoken well on a really important subject. I am indebted to Cumbria Action for Sustainability for its work in helping to bring homes up to an adequate standard to ensure energy efficiency and lower heating prices, as well as to tackle the climate emergency.

It is estimated that our homes—the ones that we live in—contribute something like 19% of the greenhouse gases emitted by the United Kingdom. In the last two years especially, there have been crushing increases in fuel poverty. Families who may have considered themselves comfortable a couple of years ago now find themselves in dire straits. Mortgage payments and rents are rising, as is the cost of living in general, but the huge increase in fuel and energy costs in the last couple of years has rendered many in a situation where they cannot see where to turn.

The need for a scheme that delivers warmer, greener and cheaper-to-run homes has never been greater, yet the number of UK energy efficiency installations peaked at 2.3 million in 2012. In the decade that followed, we got down to a miserable 100,000 a year. The Government’s much-vaunted green homes grant, which was meant to deliver energy efficiency for 1 million homes, in the end did so for only 60,000. ECO4 can and must do much better.

In Cumbria, we face specific problems that make our challenge much greater. We have a much larger proportion of solid-wall properties, of off-grid homes and of homes that are listed or in conservation areas. There are lots of positive things to say about ECO4, including, fundamentally, about its ambition of raising energy performance certificate points and its fabric-first policy—the aim to ensure that insulation happens before the installation of new and hopefully better heat sources. Those things are positive in principle, but in practice they are not entirely being followed. Households in Cumbria—especially those that can least afford it—are suffering because the detail is not being got right.

The funds provided to those installing insulation do not meet the costs, especially for single-wall properties. As we have heard, on average there has been a 77% increase in the cost of materials. Insulation is not happening because companies simply cannot afford to do it, and it is much more expensive to do the work on single-wall properties, which need it most. Insulating a single-wall property entails the further risk that moisture will build up between the wall and the insulating layer. That can lead to the build-up of mould and have a huge impact on human health and building quality in the months and years that follow.

I am told by the people who advise me on such matters that there are answers to that. Cork board or timber fibreboard can be used, as can insulating lime render, which is especially suitable for Lakeland properties in terms of its aesthetics as well as its efficacy. Frustratingly, however, none of those materials are available through the ECO4 scheme, which goes to explain why a relatively small number of people will take advantage of it.

ECO4 is a more complex scheme, as the hon. Member for Ceredigion rightly pointed out. There are many good reasons why, but one of the consequences is that the energy companies and local authorities have been reluctant to engage as providers. That means that the only people providing work through ECO4 will be independent and private providers, some of whom will be very good but some of whom will not. Private householders, almost certainly including the likes of me, are not always the best judge of which is which. That will have an impact on the quality of the work, and on whether taxpayers’ money is spent wisely. For that reason, while Cumbrian contractors have been used to deliver some of the work, Cumbria Action for Sustainability tells us that there have been no Cumbria-based companies offering ECO4 measures.

I mentioned listed properties and those in conservation areas. Residents of Westmorland living in such properties tell us that, when they explain that their home is listed or in a conservation area, suppliers almost instantly—and very politely, I hope—tell them that they are not interested, because there is no way they can make it add up and make the scheme pay.

Fuel poverty among residents of private rented properties, as has already been mentioned, is the worst of all in a community like mine. The average income in my constituency is about one twelfth of the average house price. We have a council house waiting list of 5,000 or 6,000. We have an inadequate quantity of affordable housing. The only way there is any workforce of a working age available in my constituency is because of the private rented sector, and let us say that there is a mix in its quality. Cumbria Action for Sustainability is unaware of a single private landlord in Cumbria who has pursued ECO4, as things stand.

Insulation, and the warmth and energy efficiency of any property, stands and falls on the property’s windows. Of course, ECO4 allows for funds to replace single glazing, but it will not allow funds to replace double glazing, even if it is 50 years old, past its use-by date, cracked and faulty. That appears to be a blind spot, which I hope we will act on quickly.

We have heard that ECO4 does not cover the real costs of insulation, especially in single-wall properties. That is especially so for floor insulation above garages, where there are rightly fire safety requirements, making the work more expensive. Where the scheme does not cover costs, measures are not taken, and the people who suffer are those who are left with a home that is too expensive to heat.

Cumbria Action for Sustainability and providers point out that a major reason that the green homes grant failed was the lack of skilled workers to carry out, in particular, the work needed for solid-wall housing. The situation is no better now. Retrofitting, for example, still does not feature in most relevant training schemes.

ECO4 is, in principle, better than its predecessors but, if it does not work in practice, people in Cumbria and elsewhere in our country will suffer. I will argue that ours is the most beautiful bit of the country, though it is often the coldest and the wettest, too. There are extremes of wealth and poverty, and it is hard for many of my constituents to cope with the financial costs and deprivations that go with that. More than a third of our housing stock is single-wall properties. Cumbria needs the Government to get ECO4 right. I hope they will hear the practical and constructive suggestions made by colleagues on all sides in this debate, and act accordingly.