Winter fuel scheme fails to reach families in need, charity claims
Joe Lepper
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
A discount scheme to help disadvantaged families meet their winter fuel bills has been branded a failure by Save the Children.
The charity claims just three per cent of the 800,000 families at risk of fuel poverty will benefit from the £120 reduction in their energy bills they are entitled to via the warm homes discount scheme, a partnership between the government and energy suppliers.
Energy suppliers are primarily at fault for failing to properly invest in the scheme, Save the Children claims.
The major energy companies are being called on to ensure that all families that are eligible for cold weather payments receive the warm homes discount. These payments are given to the lowest income homes, including those reliant on benefits and those with children with a disability. Payments of £25 are made when there are seven days of continuously cold weather.
Energy providers also need to improve promotion of the discount and ensure that all prepayment meter customers and those in debt are on the cheapest tariff, the charity said.
In addition, the government is being urged to offer more support to low-income families on making their homes more energy-efficient.
Save the Children chief executive Justin Forsyth said: "It’s unacceptable that 97 per cent of the UK’s poorest families, which need help heating their homes this winter, will get nothing because energy companies have not put up nearly enough money.
"Without this help the choice for parents is stark: cut back on food, get into debt or risk their children’s health because they can't afford to keep them warm. The scheme urgently needs millions more from the energy companies, or the cost will be counted in children’s futures."
The charity’s research included a survey of 1,000 parents of children under 16 and with an income of less than £12,000 per year.
A third of families said they will not be able to pay their winter energy bills. Just under half were considering cutting back on food to meet their fuel payments.
Only one in 10 parents on the lowest incomes had heard of and were planning to apply for the warm homes discount.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "We hope energy companies will strive to help all their customers that qualify."
She added that energy firms will be required to spend up to £250m on funding the discount, a 40 per cent increase on the previous year. Helping families in poverty save energy was also a priority for the department, she said.
Christine McGourty, director of energy sector trade body Energy UK, refuted the claim that just three per cent of families at risk from fuel poverty will get help from energy companies this year.
McGourty said: "Almost £180m was spent last year on voluntary schemes to help nearly two million of the most vulnerable customers, and that figure will increase to £250m this year.
"Following consultation, the government decided who will benefit from core funding under the warm home discount scheme, and those customers will get an automatic discount off their electricity bill without needing to apply for it. A wider group of 650,000 people by 2013/14 will also benefit."
She added that all major energy companies have been writing to their customers this winter promoting the help that is available.
- For advice on covering heating costs, call the Home Heat Helpline on 0800 33 66 99.
