The National Home Decarbonisation Group (NHDG) is calling on the government to announce the release of the full £3.8bn of the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund (SHDF) in the upcoming Autumn Statement.
In a letter sent to the Prime Minister, NHDG’s Chair, Derek Horrocks, said that industry confidence had been “severely shaken” by the government’s recent announcements on issues such as the closing down of the Energy Efficiency Taskforce. It goes on to point out that this may have a knock-on impact for the work in the social housing space, which is the catalyst for the wider sector – the supply chain, skills, and innovation.
The letter states:
The government’s commitment to energy efficiency has played a pivotal role in attracting investment and fostering new partnerships between industry, social housing providers, schools, colleges, and community groups to form local initiatives to provide the platform for community led skills and training in retrofit at scale. Collectively, these organisations are today creating the foundation for cost-effective future retrofitting across all housing sectors, including private rentals and privately owned homes. They are also leading the charge in reducing the costs of low carbon heating technologies through large scale deployment.
It goes on to point out the importance of improving homes, and the wider benefits retrofit delivers:
Investing in retrofitting social housing not only enhances the quality of life for those least able to afford the costs of keeping warm but also delivers tangible improvements in health and wellbeing that reduce the burden on other services such as health and social care. We understand your concern not to impose expensive changes on households before they are ready, yet the opposite is the case in social housing where many properties are crying out for improvements that will change the lives of those living in them.
The Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund (SHDF) Wave 3 has £3.8 billion already allocated and NHDG is calling on the government to announce and bring forward this funding in the Autumn Statement.
NHDG says this should be accompanied with details of the competition and an aspiration for successful bids to be announced before the end of the fiscal year, providing a clear signal to housing providers, and the decarbonisation supply chain to continue the investment in innovation, skills and training at scale – continuing to build the foundation for the drive to net zero.
Read the full letter here.
