Local authorities could have saved Green Homes Grant
The Green Homes Grant is set to deliver only a fraction of the jobs and improvements intended, leading to calls for more involvement from local authorities in future schemes.
A National Audit Office report states that the axed Green Homes Grant – offering homeowners £5,000 to make efficiency upgrades – was “delivered to an over-ambitious timetable” and “not executed to an acceptable standard”.
The scheme is expected to support efficiency measures in just 47,500 of the 600,000 homes forecast, and create 5,600 jobs over 12 months – short of the intended 82,500 over six months. Many people had a poor experience; delays in issuing vouchers to homeowners and paying installers led to more than 3,000 complaints. The scheme is expected to cost £314m, of which £50.5m will have been spent on administration.
The report recommends that the government engage properly with the supplier market for decarbonisation schemes, and base planning on a realistic assessment of how long it will take the market to mobilise.
Polly Billington, chief executive of the UK100 network of local leaders, said: “This shows the danger of short-term initiatives that don’t work with local authorities and businesses to give confidence and build supply chains. That should be a lesson to policymakers and ministers when they publish the long-awaited Heat and Buildings Strategy.”