Debate contribution: Fuel Poverty

Debate contribution by Mr David Honeyford on 16 April 2024.

MLA

Mr David Honeyford

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

16 April 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Fuel Poverty

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4483723

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I will speak to the motion from an economy and energy perspective. I echo a lot of the comments that were made by Sian, Kellie, John, Colm and the proposer of the motion. I want to look at some long-term stuff as well as practical support that we can do now. I will start at the beginning. We live on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, and, moving forward, we should have little or no need for fossil fuels. It is very simple. With new technology quickly advancing, we have all the natural resources at our disposal, and we must be looking to develop our capacity to the point where we can actually export energy rather than aim to produce 70% or 80% of our own requirement. As well as that, we should be rolling out progressive technology around biogas and hydrogen. If we do that, we could eliminate fuel poverty in the longer term. Alliance believes that that is the energy target that we need to be delivering, and it is an issue that we need to continue to work on with an all-island approach.

If we look at what we can deliver straight away — some of this has been said — we see that that includes upgrading the insulation of our houses and that improving airtightness is another way to reduce the amount of warm air that leaks out and the cold air and draughts that come in. We can and should help with such measures, which would drastically reduce the energy that is needed in the first place and protect the most vulnerable people. We should start retrofitting their homes first. Our constituents need us to make that wider change in order to transform homes from oil dependency to more energy-sustainable methods, be they biogas, heat pumps or solar panels. The initial capital outlay to upgrade property is a barrier that, with a little thought, we can help to overcome. I appreciate that the Minister is with us. A lot of what I am saying is about the economy, but that shows that we need the cross-party Executive to work together, including the Minister for the Economy, the Minister for Communities, the Minister for Infrastructure and the Minister of Health. In this case, the Department for the Economy needs to look at incentives to make it easier for people to upgrade homes and properties and for the Housing Executive and housing associations to upgrade their properties. Even a cost-neutral facility, like interest-free loans that would enable people to spread the cost over several years and thus see savings quickly, would be of huge benefit. I would love to see schemes like that being put on the table and taken forward. We need to invest now in offshore wind, onshore wind, solar, biogas and hydrogen in order to create the conditions for those technologies and industries to flourish. I stress that our green industry and all that development have been held back by an outdated and completely under-resourced planning process. Reforming that process needs to and absolutely must be one of the priorities of the Chamber to allow that development to happen and to move forward. Another practical thing that we could do quickly is to fit smart electricity meters to our homes, which would allow consumers to save money and use energy away from peak times and when excess clean energy is available. We are the only part of these islands that does not have smart meters, but they could help the situation quickly and simply. I have said before that every business should make a profit, but the other side of profit is taxation. That should redistribute wealth and support low and middle earners. Alliance —.

I thank Justin for his comment. The answer is, simply, yes. I was saying that we need to redistribute wealth. We want to live in a region where everybody thrives, so we cannot sit back and allow hugely exaggerated profits from oil and gas companies to go to just a few people with high wealth while ordinary people on ordinary incomes are hurting. While that is a Westminster issue, I stress again that Alliance believes that taxation should be progressive and must redistribute wealth fairly and protect our most vulnerable. Given all that I have said on energy, be in no doubt about this: Alliance will always stand up for people and for the planet. It will stand up for action against climate change as well as for actions to deliver net zero and a green new deal and to support new green industries. Importantly and centrally to those objectives, the Alliance party will, equally, stand up for our constituents and for equality and justice. Nobody should suffer fuel poverty in 2024.

793 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

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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