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Fuel Poverty
3. Mr. David Rendel (Newbury): What steps he has taken to end fuel poverty among pensioners. [82782]
The Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Mr. John Prescott): The hon. Gentleman will recognise that, although Britain does not have one of the coldest climates in Europe, it suffers the highest rate of deaths caused by the effects of cold and hypothermia. There were 30,000 last year. That is unacceptable. That is why we cut the VAT on fuel that the previous Government imposed. We have increased the winter fuel payment by 500 per cent. from £20 a year to £100. Today, we have published our consultation
proposals for the new home energy efficiency scheme, which will provide warmer homes for pensioners on low incomes. We believe that that will make a real difference.
Mr. Rendel: We welcome the increase in the home energy efficiency scheme, for which we have been pressing for a long time, but should not the Government consider two further measures? First, they should reduce VAT on energy insulation materials to 5 per cent. across the board. Secondly, to integrate properly across Departments, they should accept the Health Care and Energy Efficiency Bill, which is coming back to the House on Friday and which they have previously opposed. It will ensure that the health services are involved in the issue and made to play their part in avoiding pensioner fuel poverty.
Mr. Prescott: The hon. Gentleman makes two sound points. We are involved in consultation with the Department of Health on how we can help in the production of the Bill and improve it. We have made a considerable contribution to reducing fuel bills. Under the old scheme, they would have been reduced by approximately £45 a year. Our measures will lead to a reduction of £1,000 a year, which is a considerable advance.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett (Denton and Reddish): Does my right hon. Friend accept that there are hundreds of thousands of pensioners whose homes are still very poorly insulated? Their heating raises the temperature of their neighbourhood far more than it raises the temperature of their homes. Will he confirm that the regulations relating to this morning's announcement will ensure that all such people will be eligible for proper grants for complete home insulation, even if they have had a partial grant in the past? It has been a ridiculous anomaly for a long time that people who have had small draught-proofing schemes are not eligible for cavity wall insulation and proper loft insulation.
Mr. Prescott: My hon. Friend's point is sound. Those who were receiving partial grants were about only 2 per cent. of the total, and we are wiping the slate clean and making the grants available to all. We estimate that about 3.6 million households will be eligible for them, and our proposals for the first two years will directly affect about 500,000 of them.
Mr. Simon Burns (West Chelmsford): Will the right hon. Gentleman accept that the Opposition welcome his announcement this morning? However, given the overall scale of fuel poverty in this country, why will not he support the all-party warm homes campaign, which he and his hon. Friends fully supported in opposition?
Why are the Government seeking to redefine fuel poverty by excluding 5.5 million homes from a strategy to eradicate it? Does not the exclusion of those homes give a whole new meaning to the term social exclusion?
Mr. Prescott:
It is a bit much for the hon. Gentleman to be concerned about the campaign for warmer homes when the Conservatives doubled VAT on fuel. I am pleased that he welcomes the 500 per cent. increase in cold weather payments, from £20 to £100, which was made by this Government, not the previous Administration. The changes that we now propose will immediately benefit 500,000
I am sad to hear that the right hon. Member for South-West Norfolk (Mrs. Shephard) will be standing down from the Opposition Front Bench, but looking around her and hearing the latest contributions from those who are jockeying for her position, it is hard to find anyone with a face that is younger or fresher than hers who is able to match her ability.
Mr. Bill O'Brien (Normanton):
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his comments about the Government's action to end fuel poverty for many people throughout the country.
I suggest that social exclusion, to which the hon. Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) referred, was caused by the previous Government denying local authorities the chance to build old people's homes and bungalows. That means that there is now greater demand for old people's accommodation. In my constituency, old people living in a three-bedroomed house are paying £16 a week for fuel because their home is too large, and there is a shortage of bungalows and old people's accommodation.
Will my right hon. Friend take action to encourage local authorities to build more such accommodation, and to encourage the lettings programme, thus ensuring that old people in large houses will be transferred to more suitable accommodation, allowing them to escape from the fuel poverty in which they are now trapped?
Mr. Prescott:
I agree with my hon. Friend. We have a couple of pilot schemes that are dealing with those particular problems and seeking solutions. However, when I hear Opposition Members talking about the sale of council houses, I am bound to say that the greatest indictment of the Conservatives is that they accumulated between £4 billion and £5 billion in housing receipts and did not allow local authorities to use them to deal with the problems to which my hon. Friend referred.
4. Mr. David Amess (Southend, West):
What recent representations he has received about the road building programme in Essex. [82783]
The Minister of Transport (Dr. John Reid):
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has received various representations about aspects of road building and associated transport issues in Essex.
Mr. Amess:
The delays in completing the M11 link road are an absolute disgrace--for which I blame the Government--and Labour's partners, the Liberal Democrats, suffered huge reverses in Southend, West on Thursday as a result of their road-building policy. How does the Minister expect us to maintain any roads in my constituency when we have suffered a 12 per cent. cut in road maintenance as a result of the Government's policy? What exactly have the Government done since 1 May 1997 to ease traffic congestion in Southend, West?
Dr. Reid:
One road into Southend certainly seems to have been effective--the road from Basildon.
As the hon. Gentleman will know, we have adopted a policy of targeting roads for schemes that have been not only costed, but funded, unlike the fantasy football league wish list produced by the last Government. I would have thought that the hon. Gentleman would welcome the Government's decision to provide £92 million for the A130 in Essex. That is largely--although not exclusively--a result of the efforts of, among others, my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Mrs. Butler), who has made a much more constructive contribution to the Essex infrastructure than the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay (Thurrock):
Southend, and Essex generally, will benefit from the new A13; but will the Minister ask his Department to examine the impact of the new road as it crosses from Thurrock into the London boroughs, where there is considerable congestion, partly as a consequence of the improved road structure? Additional road traffic management schemes could provide greater mobility not only for commuters, but in the important corridor to the Thames gateway and the industrial areas on the river frontage. There is a problem on the London borough boundary, and I hope that the Minister will get his Department to look at it--at minimal cost.
Dr. Reid:
Everything that we do is done at minimal cost, to the benefit of the taxpayer.
Of course I will examine the problem. My hon. Friend has made a good point. We have been contributing to an integrated transport policy in Essex, using radical but rational criteria for road building, as we have elsewhere in the country. It must be said that we have not always been helped by a Tory regime in Essex--the Tory regime that cut education spending to £3 million below the Government's recommended level, knocked £8 million off the social services budget and increased school meal charges by 15 per cent. The whole House will welcome the news that that Tory administration was toppled this morning, and that there is now a Labour leader.
Sir Teddy Taylor (Rochford and Southend, East):
Is the Minister aware that it is a nightmare trying to persuade firms to establish themselves in Southend-on-Sea, where unemployment is relatively high? The problem is particularly bad in Shoeburyness. It takes about half an hour to get outside the town, because of traffic congestion. I realise that many areas suffer from congestion, but will the Minister persuade his Department to look at the congestion in Southend to see whether it is worse than the average, and whether there might be a case for a ring road? That would greatly ease all our problems.
Dr. Reid:
I speak from memory, but I believe that some years ago, there was a plan for a Rochford bypass in the hon. Gentleman's area. I think--again, I speak from memory--that the scheme was withdrawn because the last Conservative Government refused to make funds available, or at least were extremely unlikely to do so. I assure the hon. Gentleman, however, that since then Southend, and Essex as a whole, have been promoting more sustainable transport measures as part of the south-east Essex transport package. I am glad to say that my Department has supported that for the last four years, under both Conservative and Labour Governments.
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