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Planning and Energy Bill

Yes. I have long called for a ““Barnet formula”” to meet our needs, which are special to our area. Just as Scotland has its special needs, so do we. However, I digress. The £88.5 million can be used to tackle some of the problems that were identified earlier. Only 351,000— 10 per cent.—of local authority properties in Great Britain meet the full insulation standards. How do we tackle that? The decent homes standard and the money that comes with it is part of the solution. Decent homes standards are set separately from building regulations—indeed, their criteria are slightly higher. Performance criteria include providing a reasonable amount of thermal comfort through effective insulation and efficient heating. There is much further detail. The new clause would enable that requirement to be supported by local authorities through their decent homes grant. Earlier, I mentioned fuel poverty. Fuel-poor households are defined as those that need to spend more than 10 per cent. of their incomes on adequate heat and lighting. The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology note on the matter states that some 2 million households are affected by fuel poverty. I suspect that the rising cost of energy means that the position is worsening. Without new clause 1, the Bill may unwittingly contribute to making the position worse. I make the point to presage arguments that I shall present when we consider the next group of new clauses. Renewable energy, from green sources, is potentially more expensive to the consumer than energy from traditional sources. If we are to start requiring renewable energy in the wider sense as part of new developments in clause 1, the cost of heating homes may increase. We could resolve that through accepting the new clause and requiring better insulation, which counterbalances the potential increase in the cost of green energy. We must do something for the 2 million homes in the UK that are classed are fuel poor. Uptake of cavity wall insulation is low and the hon. Member for Sevenoaks needs to reflect on the Bill's potential impact on fuel poverty. In response to an intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea, I mentioned home information packs. From 1 June last year, home owners throughout England and Wales are required to provide a home information pack when marketing their homes. It was a somewhat controversial measure, which is not fully in force. However, one of requirements is to provide an A to G energy efficiency rating, similar to that given to electrical goods, to give buyers an assessment of a property's likely running costs before they buy it. We all know that, if we buy a house and get a normal survey, which states that work, such as rewiring, needs to be done, we negotiate with the vendor a reduction in the price to reflect that. The energy efficiency rating element of the home information pack can have the same effect. If one is buying an expensive house with a low energy efficiency rating, one inevitably goes back to the vendor and says, ““Look here, your windows are rattling, there's no loft insulation, the pipes aren't properly lagged. I've got an estimate of what it's going to cost to put it right and I want a reduction in the sale price to reflect that.”” I therefore believe that the energy efficiency rating is probably the most important element of the home information pack, because it is one of the moments in a building's life—when it changes hands—when something can be done about the energy requirements, especially through insulation.