PM's energy efficiency package "a slap in the face" for the fuel poor

" Reacting to today’s announcement by the Prime Minister of a new energy saving package, ACE has described it as falling well short of what’s needed to deliver the much-needed step change in the energy efficiency of our homes.

In particular ACE has accused the Government of failing those in greatest need of help. At least 4.5 million households still suffer from the scourge of fuel poverty – and Jenny Holland, ACE’s Parliamentary Co-ordinator, says that today’s announcement is nothing but a “slap in the face” for them.

She explained: “Earlier this year the Government defied its own official advisers and slashed £200 million from the 2008-11 budget for Warm Front, its main fuel poverty programme. The Prime Minister is misleading us by announcing a £74 million ‘increase’ in the Warm Front budget, when in fact he is not even restoring his earlier cut.“We have long argued that the Government is failing in its legal duty to eradicate fuel poverty. Today’s announcement has done nothing to change our view. We are urgently calling for the Government to set up an Inter-Ministerial Taskforce to kick-start a proper, co-ordinated approach to ending fuel poverty.”

While welcoming the new £910 million of investment by energy suppliers in more energy efficiency measures for households, ACE is calling on the Government to put its hand in its own pocket to stop our homes leaking heat through their roofs, walls and windows.

Alongside other leading charities and consumer groups, ACE recently signed a Fuel Poverty Charter, which calls for an extra £3 billion to be spent each year to make our homes as energy efficient as possible. Today’s announcement of roughly £350 million extra a year falls well short of what’s needed to bring about this much-needed step change in the energy efficiency of our homes. "

~Association for the Conservation of Energy (ACE)-11 September 2008.