25 Sep 2024
Political context
The energy crisis has made one thing clear: our housing stock and energy systems are broken. Without rapid, meaningful action, we’ll face continuous hardship. That’s why we've been campaigning for the government to introduce urgent solutions to provide warm homes for all.
In the run-up to the 2024 general election, thanks in part to grassroots campaigning, the Labour Party committed to deliver a Warm Homes Plan that would include an extra £6.6 billion investment in warm homes over the next parliament and upgrade 5 million homes. It's also now promised to regulate landlords so that the homes they rent out are well insulated.
This commitment is a good start, but it's not enough to ensure all cold homes are insulated. Friends of the Earth and the Institute of Health Equity estimate £6 billion a year over the next 10 years is needed to insulate the 9.6 million UK households that are on low incomes and living in poorly insulated homes. The Labour Party originally committed to this level of investment in warm homes but backtracked in February 2024, blaming the state of the economy and public finances. Since taking office, the government has continued to highlight the financial “black hole” it inherited from the previous government.
In this context, how can we as campaigners continue to push for an insulation programme that ensures nobody has to live in a cold home?
Influence the Warm Homes Plan
We need to lobby the government to publish its Warm Home Plan urgently and ensure it's as ambitious and fair as possible in its plans to insulate homes.
We’re calling on the government to:
- Act faster. The government must urgently publish its Warm Homes Plan by the end of winter 2024/25 and kickstart a nationwide insulation programme to insulate our heat-leaking homes and roll out cheap, green renewables. This plan should pledge to insulate at least 9.6 million homes through funding and regulation.
- Be fairer. The government must prioritise those most impacted by cold homes in its Warm Homes Plan, by targeting street by street insulation in energy crisis hotspots and providing additional financial support for those struggling with energy bills.
- Go further. The government must increase funding for warm homes to £6 billion a year over the next 10 years and/ or identify other policy levers and legislation to ensure all cold homes are insulated by 2035.
Although a national insulation programme may seem expensive, cold homes are costing our society billions and an insulation programme would more than pay for itself through avoided health impacts and climate costs. The government can also use other means such as legislation and regulation to ensure some homes are insulated without government investment.
Our original campaign demands
We stand by our original campaign demands and believe these are the actions necessary to ensure everyone has a warm home. We’ll continue to call for the demands below, alongside influencing the government’s Warm Homes Plan to be as urgent, ambitious and fair as possible.
1. Urgent support for people dealing with sky-high energy bills
What’s the problem? Unacceptably high numbers of households are living in cold homes. This is causing people to suffer from serious physical and mental health conditions and costing society tens of billions each year through ill health, increased bills, lost productivity and carbon emissions.
Although rising energy prices affect us all, some of us are impacted worse than others, with fuel poverty disproportionately affecting certain communities such as people of colour, disabled people, those on low incomes and private renters.
What are we calling for? In the short term, the government needs to provide urgent financial support to help all low-income households heat their homes this winter. It should then introduce a social tariff so that low-income households are charged less for their energy usage. The idea of a social tariff isn't new, and one already exists for broadband. Further research is needed to ensure a social tariff is properly targeted to support those on low incomes and people with medical needs.
2. A new emergency programme to insulate our heat-leaking homes
What’s the problem? The UK has some of the coldest and costliest homes to heat in Europe, with more than half classed as energy inefficient. Draughty homes waste energy and money and are causing serious impacts on peoples' health. They’re also bad for the planet: a fifth of the UK’s climate emissions come from heating our homes and buildings.
Upgrading our homes with insulation is the cheapest and easiest way to permanently reduce our bills and cut emissions. Insulation helps trap warmth inside, reducing the amount of energy we need to use in the first place. Over 7.2 million homes still need either cavity wall insulation, loft insulation or both. But because of the upfront cost or our housing situation, many of us can’t make the necessary changes on our own.
What are we calling for? We want to see the government introduce and fund a rapid programme of insulation and energy saving measures. Different approaches might be needed in different nations, but in England this programme should be council-led and delivered street-by-street. This approach will ensure the insulation programme is as efficient as possible and increase take-up.
The programme should start in neighbourhoods that are most affected by fuel poverty, as identified in our energy crisis hotspot data. By doing this, we can help as many people as possible stay warm during the cold winter months. The programme should be free of charge to all households in low-income neighbourhoods, and it should also include rented properties, as private renters are disproportionately affected by fuel poverty.
We’re asking for the government to invest at least £6 billion a year on average over the next 10 years, in the biggest ever home retrofit programme.
In the devolved nations, this funding should be used to deliver insulation programmes in the ways that best suit their needs.
By investing this money in insulation, we can save our society billions in costs related to the NHS, higher caring costs, bigger energy bills, lost productivity from ill health and larger carbon emissions.
3. An energy system powered by cheap, green renewables
What’s the problem? In the UK over 80% of homes are dependent on gas for heating. This over-reliance has made us vulnerable to volatile global gas prices and has left millions of us struggling to afford our energy bills.
What’s more, it's also worsening the climate crisis. Heating our homes is currently responsible for 14% of UK greenhouse gas emissions.
For too long, we’ve been left paying the price for oil and gas companies’ enormous profits. It's time we ended our reliance on this expensive and polluting fossil fuel.
What are we calling for? We need to shift towards using electric heating in our homes, powered by renewables. Heat pumps provide the best alternative to gas boilers, with new high-temperature models meaning they’re suitable for nearly all homes.
And to end our reliance on gas completely, we need the UK to move to a homegrown renewable energy system. Luckily, we have huge potential to generate clean energy both onshore and offshore from wind and solar.
Not only is renewable energy good for our planet, but it's good for our pockets too. Homegrown renewable energy is now the cheapest form of electricity. It's also much quicker and cheaper to build new onshore wind and solar farms than to develop new fossil fuel plants.
To transition to an energy system powered by cheap, green renewables, we’re calling for:
- An urgent switch to heating powered by renewable power, primarily through heat pumps.
- Support for the rapid growth of renewable power through the government’s Contracts for Difference scheme, which offers renewable energy projects a guaranteed price for the energy they produce.
- Investment in upgrading electricity networks so that they’ll cope with greater demand when electric vehicles and electric heating, such as heat pumps, become the norm.
- A change to the way electricity is priced, so it’s no longer tied to the cost of gas. At the peak of gas prices, this led to electricity costing 9 times more than it costs to generate renewable electricity. Changing this will mean renewable energy could be much cheaper, bringing down household energy bills.
See our specific asks for the Welsh Government.
By delivering on our campaign demands and implementing a Warm Homes Plan that’s fast, ambitious and fair, the government can permanently bring down our energy bills and reduce climate emissions.
Find out how you can call on your MP to deliver warm homes for all.
