The uncertainty surrounding what the Conservative Party intend to do with the energy performance certificate has become a little clearer today in a reply from Grant Shapps’ Office to a letter sent by a worried energy assessor. However as can be seen there remain a number of unanswered questions.
Questioned about the Conservative’s plans for the energy performance certificate Shapps’ Office states:
‘Where Grant talked about EPCs, there would be no changes to the role of DEAs in carrying out assessments for EPCs. By strengthening EPCs in this way, Grant expects there to be more work for DEAs.
With regards to the role of EPCs in the home buying and selling process, Conservatives have no plans to remove the requirement for an EPC. Whilst scrapping HIPs, Conservatives would restore the EPC regime to pre-April 2009 requirements. That is to say that a property could be marketed for sale provided that an EPC had been commissioned by the seller’.
So we now know under a Conservative Government we will see sellers being required (yes regulation from a party whose case for ‘scrapping’ the HIP is that it involves unnecessary bureaucracy) to commission an energy performance certificate before marketing begins. So as Shapps says we go back to how the arrangement was before the 6th April.
Fantastic you may say if you are an energy assessor, but as always with this Party there is never any detail. When will Shapps ‘get it’? The EPC without the home information pack will simply not work either from the consumer’s point of view or the environmental perspective. In the rental and commercial markets where there exists a similar arrangement for delivery, there is evidence of wide spread non compliance.
In the commercial arena for instance a survey carried out by Quidos shows that Landlord compliance with the 1-year-old Energy Performance Certificate legislation for commercial property (currently for sale or let) was still very low, with only 22% of commercial property appearing to carry a valid energy certificate.
Speaking after the publication of that report, Quidos Operations Director Nick Branch spoke in favour of moves to improve awareness of energy efficiency; "These certificates provide a valuable asset rating of the energy performance of buildings. This data can and is being used by forward thinking landlords to improve the energy efficiency, and value of their property portfolio. With low cost loans available from the Carbon Trust, these energy saving improvements can be capital neutral in the short term and revenue generating in the longer term."
By ‘liberating’ the EPC from the HIP, as Shapps puts it, he says the true benefits of the EPC will be allowed to emerge. Sorry, but this is simply rubbish! The EPC to be effective and to serve a true mechanism to bring down the level of carbon emissions it needs to remain in the HIP or a similar equivalent. The Northern Ireland experience proves this beyond doubt. In Northern Ireland where there is no HIP and where the seller is required to order an EPC one out of every two properties are marketed without the energy performance certificate.
Shapps and his Party say they are taking the ‘green’ issues seriously. If this is so why do they not acknowledge the role the HIP has played in delivering to the consumer the benefits of the data contained within the EPC. One must seriously question the Conservatives’ ‘green credentials particularly in a week where the Carbon Trust has stated the UK has no chance of hitting its target of reducing 80pc of carbon dioxide emissions by 2050 unless the commercial property sector embarks on a massive drive to improve the energy efficiency of buildings.
This coincides with the recent publication of a report from the National Energy Saving Trust that discloses that with more than one million homes changing hands in a typical year, there is the potential to reduce our annual CO2 emissions by some 1.36 million tonnes and reduce energy costs by £200 million in a single year.
If Shapps could find it within himself to step down from his personal crusade to ‘kill’ the HIP (and all those associated with it ) and begin to look objectively at the merits of retaining a vehicle like the HIP ( that has proved its worth) for the delivery of the EPC, then perhaps those who care about the environment may start to take him and his Party more seriously.
Questioned about the Conservative’s plans for the energy performance certificate Shapps’ Office states:
‘Where Grant talked about EPCs, there would be no changes to the role of DEAs in carrying out assessments for EPCs. By strengthening EPCs in this way, Grant expects there to be more work for DEAs.
With regards to the role of EPCs in the home buying and selling process, Conservatives have no plans to remove the requirement for an EPC. Whilst scrapping HIPs, Conservatives would restore the EPC regime to pre-April 2009 requirements. That is to say that a property could be marketed for sale provided that an EPC had been commissioned by the seller’.
So we now know under a Conservative Government we will see sellers being required (yes regulation from a party whose case for ‘scrapping’ the HIP is that it involves unnecessary bureaucracy) to commission an energy performance certificate before marketing begins. So as Shapps says we go back to how the arrangement was before the 6th April.
Fantastic you may say if you are an energy assessor, but as always with this Party there is never any detail. When will Shapps ‘get it’? The EPC without the home information pack will simply not work either from the consumer’s point of view or the environmental perspective. In the rental and commercial markets where there exists a similar arrangement for delivery, there is evidence of wide spread non compliance.
In the commercial arena for instance a survey carried out by Quidos shows that Landlord compliance with the 1-year-old Energy Performance Certificate legislation for commercial property (currently for sale or let) was still very low, with only 22% of commercial property appearing to carry a valid energy certificate.
Speaking after the publication of that report, Quidos Operations Director Nick Branch spoke in favour of moves to improve awareness of energy efficiency; "These certificates provide a valuable asset rating of the energy performance of buildings. This data can and is being used by forward thinking landlords to improve the energy efficiency, and value of their property portfolio. With low cost loans available from the Carbon Trust, these energy saving improvements can be capital neutral in the short term and revenue generating in the longer term."
By ‘liberating’ the EPC from the HIP, as Shapps puts it, he says the true benefits of the EPC will be allowed to emerge. Sorry, but this is simply rubbish! The EPC to be effective and to serve a true mechanism to bring down the level of carbon emissions it needs to remain in the HIP or a similar equivalent. The Northern Ireland experience proves this beyond doubt. In Northern Ireland where there is no HIP and where the seller is required to order an EPC one out of every two properties are marketed without the energy performance certificate.
Shapps and his Party say they are taking the ‘green’ issues seriously. If this is so why do they not acknowledge the role the HIP has played in delivering to the consumer the benefits of the data contained within the EPC. One must seriously question the Conservatives’ ‘green credentials particularly in a week where the Carbon Trust has stated the UK has no chance of hitting its target of reducing 80pc of carbon dioxide emissions by 2050 unless the commercial property sector embarks on a massive drive to improve the energy efficiency of buildings.
This coincides with the recent publication of a report from the National Energy Saving Trust that discloses that with more than one million homes changing hands in a typical year, there is the potential to reduce our annual CO2 emissions by some 1.36 million tonnes and reduce energy costs by £200 million in a single year.
If Shapps could find it within himself to step down from his personal crusade to ‘kill’ the HIP (and all those associated with it ) and begin to look objectively at the merits of retaining a vehicle like the HIP ( that has proved its worth) for the delivery of the EPC, then perhaps those who care about the environment may start to take him and his Party more seriously.
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