BEAMA comment on funding for improving energy performance of buildings

08 Jul 2020

BEAMA acknowledges that the measures to improve the energy performance of buildings announced today by the Chancellor are a useful starting point in ensuring the recovery from Covid-19 makes progress towards the 2050 net-zero emissions requirement. With a full budget, an energy white paper, a national infrastructure strategy, and heat & buildings strategy, transport decarbonisation plan and announcements on Building Regulations all due later in 2020, it was inevitable that today’s announcements would not solve all the challenges we face. It appears that Government has targeted measures most able to get people into work quickly.

We urge Government to confirm the details of the scheme as soon as possible to take advantage of early interest from householders, and to ensure that consumers have enough information and advice to choose the most appropriate measures for their homes. We welcome the suggestion that accredited suppliers must be used, taking advantage of recent Government support work to improve the customer experience of home improvement measures through Each Home Counts and Trustmark. It remains to be seen how long it will take to train enough new properly qualified installers to meet the Government’s estimates on the number of jobs that will be created.

We expect that the funding for public buildings will mean Government delivers on the requirement to install BACS in larger buildings. However, with a possible growth in the housing market driven by other measures announced today, it is also imperative that the delayed development of new Building Regulations are accelerated to ensure that we are not locking in inefficient homes for the future and that homes are built to the latest standards.