Agenda item

            The Committee was reminded that the Council, at its meeting on 1st December, had passed the following motion, which had been proposed by Councillor Heading and seconded by Councillor Lyons:

“This Council recognises the lengthy delays which Northern Ireland Housing Executive and Housing Association tenants across Belfast are facing when it comes to insulation inspections and insulation being provided. The absence of adequate insulation only compounds the problems arising from fuel poverty facing many citizens this winter.

The Council notes the warning provided by the Utility Regulator that Northern Ireland households are facing energy bills of around £1,000 higher than last year.

The Council will, therefore, write to the Minister for Communities requesting a review of the affordable warmth scheme, as the current threshold for support is too low and does not reflect the rising costs facing households earning more than £23,000.

The Council will also ask the Minister to undertake a public review exercise for Northern Ireland Housing Executive and Housing Association tenants to detail their experience of accessing insulation for their homes from their housing provider."

            The City Solicitor informed the Committee that a response had been received from Ms. J. Woodburn, a Housing Director within the Department for Communities.

            Ms. Woodburn had begun by stating that, when the Affordable Warmth Scheme was introduced in 2014, the income threshold had been set at £20,000 per annum to include all social security benefits.

            She had outlined the background to the establishment of that threshold by explaining that, in 2013, following successful pilots in 2012, the Department for Communities had held a public consultation and had proposed that the household annual income level be set at a modest level, in line with other Government programmes, such as the level of income for determining eligibility for free school meals, which was £16,190 per annum at that time.

            Most respondents to the consultation had agreed that eligibility for the Affordable Warmth Scheme should be determined by household income and not just on social security benefit passports. However, many respondents had felt that the income threshold proposed had been too low.

            She had explained that, following additional research and engagement with stakeholders, a further public consultation had been carried out, which had closed in February, 2018. The consultation had proposed that the income threshold be increased to £23,000 for households occupied by more than one person and reduced to £18,000 for single person households and that certain benefits, namely Disability Living Allowance, Attendance Allowance, Personal Independence Payment and Carers’ Allowance, be removed from the calculation of income. Most respondents had agreed that the disability benefits should be removed from the calculation of income but had disagreed with lowering the income threshold to £18,000 for single person households.

            Following that, the Minister had approved an increase in the income threshold to £23,000 and the removal of disability benefits from the calculation of income.  The changes to the eligibility criteria had been implemented on 1st July 2021, with the average annual income for successful applicants being around £16,000. She added that the Scheme was already oversubscribed with the current income threshold and that there were no plans to increase it.

            Ms. Woodburn had gone on to state that the Northern Ireland Housing Executive’s Cavity Wall Insulation Action Plan set out its plans for addressing issues related to cavity wall insulation installations in its stock. The Action Plan acknowledged that stock-wide cavity wall insulation remediation/replacement would be necessary but also noted that, given the significant funding required for such a programme, it could only be delivered when such funding became available, which at this time remained uncertain. In the interim, the Housing Executive would investigate and address cavity wall insulation issues where they were having a detrimental impact on the structure of the dwelling and would deliver a small annual programme to test a new cavity wall insulation extraction/installation process that will be developed.

            After discussion, the Committee noted the response and agreed that a report be submitted to a future meeting on the impact of recent rises in energy prices on fuel poverty in the City and addressing the need to improve the quality of housing overall, given the accepted link between poor housing conditions and fuel poverty.