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Cold war – Courier launches campaign to help fight fuel poverty in the Inverness and the Highlands against a background of spiralling energy costs and the impact of the coronavirus pandemic





People are facing tough choices.
People are facing tough choices.

Increasing numbers of Highland households are likely to fall into fuel poverty this winter.

That is the stark warning from a broad range of organisations who say for many people it will be a bleak choice between eat or heat and that urgent action is needed.

It comes against a background of spiralling energy costs, the impact of the coronavirus pandemic which has hit many household budgets plus the removal of the £20 uplift to Universal Credit payments.

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The Courier will highlight this situation with our new End the Chill campaign.

Later this month, the Scottish Government will publish its long-awaited fuel poverty strategy to tackle the issues.

The Highlands is already among the worst-affected regions with 33 per cent of all households living in fuel poverty and 22 per cent deemed to be living in extreme fuel poverty, according to the government’s own figures.

Only the Western Isles fared worse among all 32 Scottish local authorities.

Highland Council’s corporate resources committee was warned last week of a catastrophe waiting to happen this winter and the full council will debate the issue at its meeting on December 9.

End the Chill campaign logo
End the Chill campaign logo

Councillor Alasdair Christie, depute leader of Highland Council and the general manager of Inverness Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) paints a desperate picture.

“What we are seeing both at council and the CAB is a drastic increase in the numbers that are worried about their energy bills and in severe debt because of their energy bills and having to make heartbreaking decisions about whether to eat or heat – something which in the 21st century is a disgrace,” he said.

He said many approaching the CAB were in a really difficult position and felt they had very few choices.

“That position is causing them debt and mental health issues and stress too,” he said.

“It is also causing them to make decisions over whether to put on the heating, or do they eat, and how do they manage,” he said.

“It is having an invasive and damaging impact on their health and wellbeing.”

“It is not just people who are unemployed – it is hitting working people, too, and elderly who often live in big and uninsulated and energy inefficient homes.”

He felt both the UK and Scottish governments had a role to play in tackling the issue.

“It needs to be addressed urgently,” he said. “The only way it can be resolved is by extra money going to help people to pay off their bills, or trying to get prices down.”

Di Alexander, chairman of the Inverness, Badenoch and Strathspey CAB and the Highlands and Islands Housing Associations Affordable Warmth group, agreed.

“Unless there’s a dramatic shift in the policies of both the Westminster and Holyrood administrations then many more households are going to fall into fuel poverty as winter sets in and increasing numbers of fuel poor households are forced to save on their ever-increasing fuel bills by turning their heating down or off and live with the ensuing health and morale consequences,” he said.

“The chilling phrase ‘heat or eat’ encapsulates their predicament.”

The Highland Senior Citizens Network, which campaigns for older people, believes pensioners are particularly vulnerable to falling into the fuel poverty trap.

Dr Ian McNamara, the network’s chairman, said with the state pension not keeping up with inflation due to the suspension of the triple lock formula, he feared more people would find themselves struggling to heat their homes, particularly those living on their own.

He acknowledged that people could seek advice on how to economise but did not feel it was the right answer.

“I don’t think there is a quick fix other than money,” he said.

A Scottish Government spokesman said it was committed to ending fuel poverty entirely and had the most ambitious and comprehensive fuel poverty legislation on this in the UK.

“By the end of this year, we will have allocated over £1 billion since 2009 to tackling fuel poverty and improving the energy efficiency of people’s homes to make them warmer and cheaper to heat.

“Ground-breaking investment of at least £1.8 billion over the next five years is also under way to help transform the heating and energy efficiency performance of Scotland’s buildings still further.”

It was making £10 million of funding available through its Fuel Insecurity Fund to help people struggling with heating costs this winter and had increased funding for its Warmer Homes Scotland scheme to help households in fuel poverty.

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