Agenda item

Gareth Jones will update the panel on his portfolio including house insulation to the most needy. (10 mins)

Gareth Jones, Head of Climate Change and Sustainable Living presented the Green Homes Grant Local Authority Delivery (LAD 2 and 3) update.

Gareth provided an insight on the funding that is available and has been available for retrofitting homes.

Green Homes Grant funding was the general overarching bracket and BEIS distributed the money. Bracknell Forest Council had previous success with LAD 1A which had allowed for retrofitting in a number of properties across the borough. The Green Homes Grant funding covered a range of retrofitting including wall/loft/floor insulation, solar panels and heat pumps. The funding focused on homes that were hard to heat, generally with an E, F or G energy efficiency rating and also those on low levels of income, which tended to be those households with less than £30k disposable income after rent or mortgage payments.

The most recent batches of funding were LAD 2 and LAD 3, with the latter also being referred to as sustainable warmth. Both of these projects had slightly different delivery than LAD 1.

For LAD 2 the council had initially been allocated £276k for work within Bracknell Forest Council, this was part of a Berkshire wide bid. However, there was a delay in arranging the Managing Agent for the scheme, and were only in place in December 2021, when the scheme was due to start in April 2021. As a consequence of the delay, Bracknell Forest Councils allocation was reduced to £87k. Bracknell Forest Council identified 32 potential properties, and these were put forward to the managing agent to consider. Following surveys 14 homes had been put forward for possible works allocation subject to the procurement of contractors. Gareth advised that of those 14, 8 were definitely having work done, 4 were waiting for further information and 2 had unfortunately been cancelled.

For Sustainable Warmth (LAD 3) the scheme was supposed to start in April 2022 and run for a calendar year. Bracknell Forest Council had bid for a standalone grant which was an unsuccessful bid of £1.3m. However, after the Council received notification of the unsuccessful bid GSEEH proposed a Berkshire wide approach as they had bid successfully across Berkshire. Bracknell Forest Council expressed an interest that they wished to be included, and confirmation had been received in the last week that this had been granted. The scheme had been slow and work had only started in the last month, and late inclusion hadn’t hindered the council too much, however timescales were tight with work needing to be finished by March 2023. Funding included a budget of £10k to support marketing efforts which needed to be undertaken in October.

GSEEH were now reporting improvement in their staff resourcing which at times had impacted the schemes. At one point there was a delay of 12 weeks from identification by the Council to the first survey.

The survey led to an advised ‘shopping list’ of retrofit works required which could be one, two or three different improvements. A procurement exercise was then undertaken, with 3 contractors able to bid for each improvement, and were able to bid for more than one. The works was then agreed if it fell within budget. It was quite complicated as households could have more than one contractor working within their house.

The Council were still waiting on confirmation of LAD 2 successes and with the news of inclusion to Sustainable Warmth (LAD 3) targeted marketing was about to commence.

Looking forward Hazel Hill had a database of properties in the council which showed the energy rating of around 95% of homes in the borough which allowed for targeted marking for the management agent.

Home Upgrade Grant Funding was now being promoted as Sustainable Warmth was nearing an end, wave 2 was open now until the end of October and Bracknell Forest Council would express an interest in funding.

SILVA Homes were currently biding for wave 2 of the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund, which was a separate funding stream route. It was unsure what this bid would be, but a lot of work had been undertaken over the summer.

During a period of discussion, the following points were made, and answers were

given:

·       GSEEH were an organisation appointment by the Government.

·       Each of the hubs were responsible for specific areas of the country.

·       The council acted as signposting in the schemes

·       There had been some confusing regarding the contractors in LAD 2 but going onto LAD 3 the process should be better and resident’s questions would be better answered going forward.

·       Each funding scheme differed under eligibility criteria, it was a generalisation that most targeted homes were energy inefficient and fell under a E,F or G rating. An up to day EPC certificate for the home would also be looked out. For financial eligibility, households would need to have a take home income of circa £30k per annum after mortgage or rent payments.

·       The database contained information from a number of sources and was a live database. Hazel also had access to a national database and was able to take information directly from residents.

·       Residents are advised to take a fabric first approach and make their houses as airtight as possible. Then they can look in to heating systems such as solar panels or heat pumps.

·       The energy efficiency pages on the Bracknell Forest Council website were a very good starting point and could be found under the housing section.

·       Gareth was unsure if all housing associations were spoken too and would check the interactions with Hazel and would report back.