Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
100-108)
MR JOHN
SLAUGHTER, MR
DAVE MITCHELL,
MR LEWIS
SIDNICK AND
MR NEIL
JEFFERSON
20 MAY 2008
Q100 Colin Challen: Can we just move
off the land issue for a moment? Some of the objections that consumers
currently raise are that they do not like the lack of gas cookers,
which I can understand in certain regards, they do not like the
absence of power showers, they do not like energy-saving light
bulbs and they throw them all out and replace them with the old-fashioned
type, all these sorts of things. We have seen that the Government
is now moving on light bulbs; would you go out and campaign to
reduce consumer choice for example in shower technology? There
is going to be less choice with light bulb technology so will
you go out and campaign to make these transitions possible?
Mr Slaughter: I am not sure we
would campaign for that, we might campaign—
Q101 Colin Challen: Would you campaign
for anything of this sort?
Mr Slaughter: If I may finish
my answer, we might campaign for something slightly different
which is a positive way of achieving the outcome that is desired
that meets consumer wishes. We seriously believe you cannot buck
the consumer trend in this field because the policy will fail
if you do and at the moment unless the whole market is moved away
from something like a power shower product there is nothing that
would necessarily prevent someone retro-fitting a power shower.
Q102 Colin Challen: That is my point,
is the power of Government to do that, to change the market?
Mr Slaughter: Yes, but my point
is that for it to be successful—and I am not disagreeing
with the principle behind what you are raising, but it is really
the way in which you successfully address it—the way you
need to address it is a solution that we know consumers generally
will be able to work with. What consumers like about a power shower
is the amount of water coming through the shower, so you need
to work on developing effective systems that produce a similar
outcome but are nevertheless water-efficient in that case. That
might be a question of how you link it into rainwater harvesting
and systems around that, for example. I think we would want to
look, as far as we could, at ways of doing things that were successful
both in terms of policy objectives and that we felt reasonably
confident consumers would be able to buy into.
Q103 Colin Challen: On that basis
you would then perhaps argue that if people sourced their electricity
from renewable sources they should be allowed to continue to use
incandescent light bulbs, that is the same argument.
Mr Slaughter: Not entirely. Can
I make a wider point here? The problem is that we can only address
so much in practice in terms of specifically new housing and a
lot of the issues you are raising are much bigger, society-wide
issues. We have no problem in engaging with them but I think we
probably need an agreement, as a society, about which way we want
to go on some of these things. It is not necessarily feasible
to try and drive everything just through new house-building in
relation to this.
Q104 Colin Challen: Housing is 40%
of our carbon emissions, but can we move on.
Mr Slaughter: But that is including
existing stock.
Q105 Colin Challen: Exactly, we have
to define that too, but just looking at adaptations—if we
move on and now look at mitigation—do you think that building
standards will ensure that new houses will be fully compliant
if you like with flooding risk and all the other problems that
climate change will throw at us, and will those standards also
apply to existing housing stock? How can we implement measures
there that transfer from new build to existing stock?
Mr Mitchell: There is a consultation
out at the moment on the future of building control which also
involves the simplification of building regs et cetera, and there
is a part in there to do with the existing stock and how we bring
it forward. One of the things I wanted to say earlier was that
if we woke up tomorrow and every new home that we built was zero
carbon, we would not actually be reducing the carbon footprint
of this country; the clever trick lies in bringing the 25 million
existing homes along with us, that is when you start to get a
reduction. We need to move along those lines and do this sort
of thing, and this is another reason why we need to be 100% confident
that renewable technology works. If the existing homes start to
use it and find that they get a bad result for whatever reason,
what makes me think they are going to want to buy new homes if
they have had that bad result on existing homes. We therefore
really need to look at existing homes and bring them along on
the journey with us.
Q106 Chairman: Hang on a minute,
you have raised all sorts of sometimes rather spurious objections
in terms of tightening up standards on new homes but it is vastly
more expensive and complicated to do it on existing homes, so
if we said you have to start there you would be raising even more
objections.
Mr Mitchell: If the Cyril Sweett
report is right[7]—and
it says you need to spend £30,000 to get to zero carbon—how
many cavities could you insulate on existing homes for £30,000
and get more CO2 reduction in that one house—and if it is
England Plc that we are trying to save the carbon for ...
Q107 Chairman: This Committee has made
a whole series of recommendations to give greater priority to
making existing homes more energy efficient, which is not the
point, but in terms of achieving zero carbon homes—which
is what we have been talking about—you have said how frightfully
difficult and expensive it is to do it for new homes, you are
not seriously trying to say it would be cheaper to do it for existing
ones are you?
Mr Slaughter: No, I do not think
so in the same way, but this is also where maybe we can be clever
about it. Given what we were talking about earlier on the energy
supply side I think the UK Green Building Council report last
week, on the definition of zero carbon,[8]
was very interesting because it pointed out the practical limits
of what could be achieved on a site for new development, so in
principle I think we are likely at least to be looking at an increase
in a substantial way in local community renewable energy schemes,
for want of a better expression. If that is the case then there
is enormous potential to develop systems that work not just for
new development but for the surrounding existing housing stock
and nearby commercial, industrial and public service uses. That
has a number of benefits: not only does it potentially provide
a more cost-effective way of decarbonising everyone, it also means
you have a more interesting investment proposition on the commercial
side from an energy supply perspective—you will have a balanced
load, you will have a range of users and that makes configuration
of a local system more attractive and more commercially interesting.
I think therefore that if we look at that somewhat bigger picture
in terms of how the new build and the existing stock can perhaps
work together, then maybe we can actually make that a win win
for everybody.
Mr Jefferson: The point about
consumer engagement is absolutely critical which is why NHBC and
the NHBC Foundation have done so much work on it. What has become
clear through that work is that over the last 20 to 30 years,
probably slightly longer, buying a new home is shown to be quite
aspirational and quite often people are buying into a lifestyle
which, over the years, has brought with it higher levels of insulation,
double-glazed windows, central heating, en-suite bathrooms et
cetera. As we move forward to the next phase, which is to deliver
homes which produce less carbon, as we stand here at the moment
there are one or two compromises to be met for the people who
live in those homes, which are set out in the reports that have
been produced by the NHBC Foundation. Going forward we just have
to make sure in terms of making a decision that people choose
to live in zero carbon homes, that they do not see the compromises
but see the features and the benefits and perhaps, because there
are also changes being driven through the existing stock, they
do not regard new build as being particularly peculiar. The idea
of using less water, which code level 3 homes will do—there
are some very ambitious targets for reducing water use and we
are beginning to see ways of how that will be achieved—the
things that appeal to consumer are that that becomes more normal
in terms of how much people pay for water and the importance which
is placed on water, but also perhaps through changes which, as
the Committee has already mentioned, are extremely difficult to
retrofit to the millions of existing homes that are out there.
That is the challenge ahead, to recognise that there is one housing
market and not a market for new homes and a market for existing
homes.
Q108 Joan Walley: Can I follow that
up because each of you has mentioned water efficiency and water
harvesting, but I am still not clear what work you have been doing
to try and promote that so that that is incorporated into the
new homes you are building. It seems to me that you are talking
very much in the abstract and not in terms of how that applies
to incorporating that in design standards.
Mr Mitchell: The water conservation
area and saving water comes into the code for sustainable homes
at various levels. A lot of our members are now trying on certain
developments to build to code level 3 and code level 4 and putting
in what you need to put in to get to the various levels that are
required for water. We talked about power showers earlier and
one of the things we are experimenting with there is a shower
head which sucks air in as well as pushing water out so you get
the effect of a power shower but in fact you are using less water.
All these sorts of technologies are being put into the homes that
we are experimenting with to see if we can get to these code levels.
It is a menu of different things, if you do that you have saved
a bit of water so you can perhaps use a bit somewhere else; it
is judging what the consumer wants and what the consumer will
be happy with at the end of the day. We are looking at all these
measures within the Code for Sustainable Homes.
Chairman: We have covered some interesting
ground this morning and we are very grateful for your time. There
is a lot more we might explore but we are past the deadline now
so thank you very much for coming in.
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