Yesterday, 12 December, a mere six weeks after the policy was announced, the Conservative-led Government slashed the Feed-in Tariff – a scheme which helped people to install renewable technology, drive jobs and growth in the green economy and help those on low incomes with their fuel bills.
Despite this extraordinarily tight deadline, Islington’s Labour Council succeeded in installing 20 new solar panels on social housing estates in the week before 12 December.
Cllr Paul Smith, Executive Member for the Environment (pictured here with Cllr James Murray, Executive Member for Housing) explained: “We pulled out all of the stops to get this work completed on time because we understand the concerns of local families struggling with fuel bills, and we are on their side.
Solar panels can reduce energy bills and put money back into the pockets of the households where they are installed. Islington Labour is determined to stop vulnerable people sliding into fuel poverty and having to make that terrible choice between heating and eating. Reducing energy bills in this way is a key weapon in our battle against fuel poverty.”
External funders paid for 20 solar panel systems with contractors fixing them. Residents don’t pay a penny for installation or maintenance but receive the benefit of reduced bills.
Motion at Full Council
At last week’s Full Council meeting, Cllrs unanimously passed a motion criticising the Government for this rushed and unfair cut and calling on them to reverse their decision.
Speeches during the debate on the motion (including this one) highlighted how this rushed cut will prove to be a costly decision. In October Chris Huhne, the Lib Dem Energy Secretary, boasted that “over the last financial year, nearly 4,500 new jobs were created in the low-carbon sector, which grew by 4.3%.” However, his policies are now slashing jobs in one of the few growth industries in the economy.
Analysis from energy consultancy Element Energy, for Friends of the Earth, predicts cuts to FIT payments will result in the loss of between 18,000 and 29,000 jobs depending on the outcome of the consultation on the reduction. It calculates that this will cause a corresponding tax drop of between £150 million and £230 million a year – hardly a good step when trying to reduce the deficit.
Speakers also pointed out that Chris Huhne had set a consultation period on this issue to run until 23 December 2011 ahead of proposed cuts in April 2012. However, he then pre-emptively brought forward the cut to 12 December 2011 proving that the consultation was a farce.
His decision to reduce tariffs this week, rather than in April as planned saves just £10 million according to the Government’s own Impact Assessment. For the sake of saving such a relatively small amount of money countless community energy schemes including those of many housing associations, have folded, because they had been planning on the expected date, and simply could not sort everything out in 6 weeks.
The only people who will benefit from this are the big energy companies, whose domination of the energy market is threatened by the green energy sector.
Friends of the Earth Campaign
To follow up on this motion and debate, Islington Council has now joined over 100 organisations including the CBI, the Federation of Small Businesses and the TUC in signing a Friends of the Earth campaign statement against the planned cut.
