A coalition of groups is launching a new campaign that joins together the dots on the climate, housing, and fuel poverty crises. Retrofit For the Future plans to put renters’ rights and a green and just transition for workers at the heart of the retrofit debate.
Retrofit For the Future
Fuel Poverty Action, ACORN, Greener Jobs Alliance, Medact, and the Peace & Justice Project will be officially launching the new initiative on Wednesday 19 March. You can join them online for this at 7.30pm if you sign up here.
The campaign will call on the government to direct its attention to retrofit-upgrading and improving existing homes. It will set out the compelling case that doing so is a key to tackling both the climate emergency and the housing crisis.
In a nutshell, retrofitting is about bringing homes up to better standards of thermal efficiency. It involves updates like installing insulation, improving ventilation, and replacing gas and electric boilers with heat pumps, alongside solar panels and battery storage. Residential buildings currently account for a fifth of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions, mainly through heating, hot water, and electricity.
Meanwhile, in 2022, little over half (52%) of properties in England had Band C ratings – above the average for energy efficiency. While plenty of households in this band and above are still in fuel poverty, retrofitting could help many in less energy efficient homes. According to Action on Empty Homes:
A properly insulated, energy efficient home can reduce CO2 emissions by up to 1 tonne a year, and reduce heating bills by c30%.
On its current trajectory, the government is also only set to send emissions in the housing sector soaring. Notably, as the Canary’s Charlie Jaay has pointed out previously:
The government’s house building targets would make it impossible to meet our net-zero targets by 2050 and, unless the right houses are built at the right price for those who really need them, they will do nothing to solve the housing crisis.
So instead, retrofitting plots a more sustainable and fairer path forward. It’s one that avoids the pitfalls of fossil fuel-intensive developments – and in particular those that aren’t genuinely geared towards increasing social housing availability.
Three demands for the retrofit revolution
As such, the groups are preparing to drive home that:
If properly implemented, retrofit can help lower energy bills, create warm and comfortable homes, contribute to a fairer, more sustainable future, create high-skilled green jobs and boost economic growth.
Crucially, the campaign aims to temper against the government continuing to run roughshod over residents and workers in the process of addressing the housing crisis. It will argue for three core principles that must be at the centre of this retrofit revolution:
- Accountability for retrofit work.
- A Workforce Skills Plan.
- Protecting Private Renters.
Specifically, demand one lays out that:
Residents must be at the heart of the retrofit process – before, during and after. There must be independent assessment and regulation of retrofit work and there should be a robust system for measuring effectiveness with the results made public.
In other words, retrofitting must not be imposed on residents, and there should be independent mechanisms for them to hold companies, councils, and the government to account.
Fuel Poverty Action has penned a separate letter to parliamentary under-secretary of state for the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ). This was in response to her announcement that the DESNZ was cracking down on dodgy businesses installing poor-quality insulation. It encapsulates some of the reasons why this demand is vital to any discussion on the future of retrofit, noting for example that:
Structural incentives prioritise quick and easy retrofits over quality and need, building in shoddy workmanship. Cowboy contractors – large and small – leave people’s homes with inadequate ventilation causing damp and mould, or with hanging wires, ill-fitting windows, and other products of unaccountable work instead of improved warmth, comfort and health.
Residents, renters, and workers must be at the heart of it
Building on this, the second demand stipulates that:
A well-trained workforce is essential for delivering an effective, sustainable retrofit programme. Without urgent action, the UK risks missing a crucial opportunity to tackle the climate crisis, lower energy bills, improve the housing stock, and create secure, skilled occupations and a future for young people.
That is, workers need a green and just transition in the housing sector – with training, greater prospects, and opportunities on the table. And finally, the last demand argues that renters’ rights is a central, essential tenet of Retrofit For the Future:
If the government is serious about improving homes for millions of renters then it must introduce a moratorium on any no fault eviction grounds during the retrofit process and for 2 years following improvements being made; and a freeze on rent increases during the retrofit process and for 2 years following improvements being made, raising to 6 years if a public grant has been accessed.
In short, it’s warding against profiteering landlords ramping up rents, and evicting tenants after home improvements. Of course, protecting tenants from backdoor rent hikes is something the Labour Party’s flagship Renters’ Rights bill that it has much-touted, has inexplicably omitted.
So, with the government continuing to greenlight climate-wrecking developments, failing to enact proper rent controls and provide genuine affordable homes, these are all vital conversations to be having.
Featured image supplied
