Prime Minister in battle to save Green Deal

The Prime Minister David Cameron has called for a high level briefing from the Cabinet Office on how to rescue his Government’s flagship Green Deal.

There is growing concern that the launch of the Green Deal this October will be a flop. Even the big six energy providers have asked for a delay so that all the details can be finalised.

There is a real fear amongst industry and stakeholders that consumers will fail to buy into the complicated scheme.

There is also evidence that the scheme as it stands could all but destroy the loft and cavity wall insulation industry. The government’s own impact assessment for the Green Deal shows that loft insulation and cavity wall insulation will reduce by 93% and 70 % respectively under the scheme. This document runs to 297 pages, indicating how complex the scheme set-up is.

The Government aims to upgrade the energy performance of 3.6m homes by 2022, which would require around a 1,000 installations every day.

Mike Leonard, director of the Modern Masonry Alliance, said: “Successful consumer campaigns have to be market driven. The needs and requirements of consumers came last in this process.”

“Over 70 full time civil servants have worked studiously in their London bunker to create yet another bureaucratic nightmare that even the most optimistic give little chance of long term survival.

“We urgently need to form a task group comprised of industry, local government and consumers to come up with a simple incentive led plan based on doing the simple things to improve the energy efficiency of our 26 million existing homes.”