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I believe the Scottish Government are not being ambitious enough with their distant target to tackle fuel poverty in Scotland by 2040.
As such, I introduced an amendment in the upcoming fuel poverty bill to move the fuel poverty target from 2040 to 2032, becuase the 2040 target is not ambitious enough, and we also need to be more ambitious in driving the Government’s fuel poverty objectives.
However, this was not accepted and was voted down at the committee level by both the SNP and Conservatives.
Fuel poverty has been a subject for discussion in the Scottish Parliament since its initial inception in 1999, however targets had been set and missed by successive governments and now 20 years later in 2019, 1 in 4 households in Scotland still live in fuel poverty.
On top of this, I raised the issue of non-standard housing, such as stuart steel-frame and timber frame houses found across Mid Scotland & Fife, and the lack of funding available for insulating these types of properties.
The funding that is available through the various grants is not enough to pay for the types of insulation that are needed resulting in many households not being supported with insulation.
There are not enough resources. We are not doing enough in relation to that driver of fuel poverty, so we need to be able to do more.
I am disappointed the SNP and Tories voted together to kick tackling fuel poverty into the long grass.
I think we need to be ambitious for Scotland, we should be saying that fuel poverty in Scotland is not acceptable and politicians should be earning their crust by doing everything that they can to eradicate fuel poverty, including bringing the target forward.
