With the backing of big businesses and prominent charities, the Energy Bill Revolution is taking its fight all the way to the top
Nearly one quarter of mothers must regularly choose between buying food and heating their homes, according to a survey by campaign group Energy Bill Revolution. The group surveyed 1,000 users of the parenting website Netmums and found that 23% had faced the dilemma on more than one occasion.
Responding to the survey results, founder of Netmums Sally Russell said: “These are impossible choices for families to make, as both [heating and food] are essential to good health and children’s safety and security.”
However, the Energy Bill Revolution is campaigning for change. Backed by businesses, national charities and trade unions, the group is calling on government to invest the money it will raise from carbon taxes into improving the energy efficiency of homes. Over the next 15 years, the government will raise £63bn in carbon taxes; money which the Energy Bill Revolution estimates could insulate millions of homes and knock more than £300 off the average family’s fuel bill.
Pre-empting the official launch of the Green Deal – a government scheme to help people finance energy efficiency improvements to their homes – the Energy Bill Revolution group has written to the prime minister with its survey results, urging him to consider their proposals. The letter to David Cameron included 16 pages of signatures from directors and CEOs of prominent national charities and businesses.
Director of the Energy Bill Revolution, Ed Matthew, writes that an investment in energy efficiency “is also one of the best ways to generate economic growth and jobs and reduce carbon emissions,” and notes that whatever the outcome of the Green Deal, it will not be enough to address what he describes as a “fuel poverty crisis.”
Since the campaign’s launch in 2012, it has also gathered the backing of 180 MPs.
