New loans and grants for homeowners to pay for green energy technology such as heat pumps and solar panels will help deal with the cost of living crisis, Ed Miliband has promised as he called for cheaper energy to be available for “not just the wealthiest”.
The Government is publishing its long-delayed warm homes plan which sets out how £15bn of state funding will be used to help reduce energy bills, and help the Government meet its net-zero target.
High-street lenders will be subsidised to provide low-interest loans of thousands of pounds to help homeowners pay for upgrades, such as installing solar panels on their roof and a battery to store surplus power generated when it is sunny, as well as “smart controls” for home heating.
Separate funding will be available specifically for lower-income households, who will be eligible for totally free installations of technology like solar and heat pumps.
Landlords will also be pushed to improve standards in the homes they own so that renters can also benefit from cheaper bills.
Warm home plan to ‘bring down cost of living’
In total, ministers are aiming to upgrade five million homes by the time of the next general election, with a long-term goal of ensuring that almost every new home is fitted with solar panels and primarily heated by a low-carbon system such as a heat pump.
The Government has also pledged to reduce net carbon emissions to zero by 2050.
The existing £7,500 grant for upgrading to a heat pump will stay in place and grants will now be available for pumps that cool homes as well as warming them, as first revealed by this newspaper last year.
The announcement is part of a Labour drive to prove to voters that the Government is pushing down the cost of living. Miliband, the Energy Secretary, told The i Paper that living standards were “the biggest issue by far” for the public.
He insisted that householders were already opting for clean energy thanks to the savings that are available for many bill-payers switching from gas to electric heating.
He said: “It is really striking to me that rooftop solar was at record levels last year in the UK, heat pump take-up was at record levels, but we want that offer to be extended to not just the wealthiest who can afford it but beyond that – and that is what this plan does.
‘Rooftop solar was at record levels last year,’ according to the Energy Secretary (Photo: Christopher Furlong/Getty)“And whether it is solar panels or heat pumps or batteries, all of these things that are a route to lower bills, we want those things to be available to people.”
Miliband’s challenge to Tories and Reform
Miliband promised that Labour would challenge opposition parties which are increasingly sceptical about the way the UK is looking to tackle climate change.
He said: “The truth is that while our critics, while Reform and the Tories, set their face against clean energy, they are setting their face against things that can lower people’s bills… So bring it on, let’s bring on the argument about whether we should give people access to this clean tech.”
Both Reform and the Tories have pledged to scrap the net-zero target.
The minister added that he remains committed to two ambitious and controversial promises that he made at the last general election, to remove fossil fuels from the electricity grid by 2030 and to cut the average home’s energy bill by £300 a year.
The state-backed loans offered by banks will spark a further expansion of private lending for home upgrades, junior energy minister, Martin McCluskey, predicted.
He told The i Paper: “Perhaps somebody goes to their bank, the Government component of the loan pays for and subsidises the cost of finance for a heat pump, a battery and solar, but that bank may then decide they want to offer a loan that covers home insulation and other home upgrades. What you’re then able to do is bring the cost of finance right down.”
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He also pledged that there would be “no boiler ban” for people who want to keep or replace their gas boiler, adding: “Absolutely no one is going to be forced to do this.”
Claire Coutinho, the Conservatives’ shadow Energy Secretary, said: “Four in five households will receive no benefit from this plan, but they will suffer from higher taxes and higher electricity bills thanks to Ed Miliband’s political choices.
“Unless the Government gets serious about cutting electricity bills now, many of these taxpayer-funded schemes will saddle households with high ongoing running costs every single year.”
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