Additional funding to help tackle fuel poverty has been announced by Chancellor ...

Additional funding to help tackle fuel poverty has been announced by Chancellor Alistair Darling as one of the allocations in the Government’s prebudget report. The additional spending will see Warm Front (the Government’s major fuel poverty programme) receive extra funding of £100mn, and £50mn of existing allocation to be spent a year sooner than planned. Other environmental measures announced in the pre-budget report include extended support for renewable energy and investment in railways, flood defences and British waterways. The new funding brings the total funding for fuel poverty to £974mn for three years to March 2011, resulting in benefits for an additional 60,000 homes, says the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC). The spending is in addition to the £910mn in funding the Government has secured from energy companies to make homes more energy efficient. The Chancellor has also requested that Ofgem publish quarterly reports over the coming year showing the relationship between wholesale prices, estimated hedged wholesale costs and averaged retail prices for gas and electricity. The move is expected to create additional downward pressure as well as ensure transparency over future price changes. In addition the Chancellor announced the extension of the Renewables Obligation (RO) from its current end date of 2027 to at least 2037. ‘We want the most vulnerable homes to have the heating and insulation improvements they need as quickly as possible’, said DECC Secretary Ed Milliband. ‘While Warm Front has helped lift thousands of households out of fuel poverty, there is always room for improvement. We are working to ensure that Warm Front provides the best service it can in the most cost-effective way. The new funding will also help protect jobs in the construction industry.’ The move to extend the RO to 2037 was welcomed by the British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) and ScottishPower Renewables, which both believe the move will increase investor confidence and ensure long-term stability for developers and wind farm operators.