Debate contribution: Fuel Poverty
Debate contribution by Ms Kellie Armstrong on .
- MLA
- Ms Kellie Armstrong
- Party at the time
- Alliance Party
- Date
- 16 April 2024
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Opposition Business
- Heading
- Fuel Poverty
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4483717
Read the official Assembly record
Text
On behalf of the Alliance Party, I can say that we will support the Opposition motion on eradicating fuel poverty. I can also confirm that I am very aware that the Minister's officials have been holding fuel poverty strategy pre-consultation meetings to look at the climate change objectives. My staff attended one of those meetings. I have to say that it was very helpful, resourceful and thought-provoking. As the motion states, we should be working to eradicate fuel poverty and the next Programme for Government should include clear targets to achieve that. How we achieve that was discussed at the pre-consultation event. Will it be person-led or stock-led? To explain: do we deal with people or homes? We could certainly provide people with money to deal with their bills, as we have in the past. We could cap bills, or we could have price protections in place. Those are some of the short-term actions that we could take. Fixing cold homes is another way. The other thing that we need to consider is who we will help first. I am sure that many in the House have received papers from Age NI and others that outline the issues that there are for people who are at home during the day, are often quite immobile and who depend on having the heating on to help them. I think of older people and people with disabilities who are immobile. While those people may well be asset rich, they are income poor. We have to consider how we will help them. Others have mentioned rural homes. I live in one of them. At the moment, I am dependent on oil. We need to bring oil into line with other fuel supply under the Utility Regulator. That will not be for the Minister for Communities to deal with; it will be for the Minister for the Economy. That is a longer-term issue. The other thing — it is close to my heart — is what we will do about retrofitting or establishing Passivhaus-standard homes across Northern Ireland. I have spent a good bit of time, I have to say, going around looking at options for retrofitting. It will not come cheap. The fabric-first approach that is already being taken by the Housing Executive, for instance, to put insulation into homes goes some way towards helping with that. Recently, I met the Northern Ireland Housing Executive. We talked about its heat pilot scheme. It is targeted at 300 homes across Northern Ireland. That is very welcome, but it is focused on gas-fuelled homes. If we are serious about eradicating fuel poverty, we have to help people to move away from fossil fuels so that they can heat their homes in the most cost-efficient way. I have seen amazing results in retrofitted homes that I have visited. One lady with a grown-up family went from paying £500 on her oil bill every couple of months to paying out no more than £20 a fortnight for her heat and light, and that is absolutely incredible. It has been brought up at the fuel poverty strategy pre-consultation events that we need a new definition of fuel poverty. That could be taken forward by the task force that is mentioned in the motion, or in the consultation that takes place on the fuel poverty strategy. Yesterday was a good example of how the House can come together to agree on an anti-poverty strategy. That strategy, which will look at child poverty, could also include the fuel poverty work that needs to be done. We need to think about fuel poverty as a way to move forward on our climate change objectives. I welcome the motion, which is very timely. We have nearly run out of time to get this work done. We have people who will no longer get a cost-of-living support from the UK Government in the year ahead. That additional money, which they have had in the past, will not be there this winter. We need to think about how we are going to do things in the short term and the long term. As one of the many MLAs who were able to roll it out, I pay tribute to the Bryson House support scheme, which has helped people with their energy costs. That community and voluntary sector support scheme has delivered support directly to people to help them to meet their bills. I hope that this is the last year that we have to do that, and that we can do something more proactively in the long term to help to reduce those bills forever.
770 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.02 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.96).
- No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
- Subject area: Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits.
- The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.03 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.01 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.02 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.02 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.96 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.02 | At or below not-flagging threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 1.00 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.00 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits | 0.73 |
| Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups | 0.21 |
| No identity-related subject | 0.06 |
| Flags, emblems, symbols, names and memorials | 0.00 |
| Parades, bonfires and commemorations | 0.00 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:58 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
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