Miliband 'not in control of 80% of domestic energy-saving target'

Minister has no say over building regulations and environment-friendly goods that form bulk of meeting obligations, warns public accounts committee
David Hencke, Westminster correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 3 March 2009 14.52 GMT

Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, has no direct control over 80% of the savings needed to meet challenging EU demands for cuts in household energy consumption by 2020, a report by MPs says today.
It warns that the bulk of savings will need to come from the enforcement of building regulations and obligations on electrical, heating and building suppliers to provide energy-efficient goods. None of this is under direct ministerial control, yet the supply and regulation of energy-efficient materials and goods will account for the vast majority of savings to meet the 2020 target of a 36% cut in household consumption.
According to the report, hardly any checks are made to see if new homes meet building regulation standards and very little work has been done to see if installed insulation does not leak heat or whether homes are poorly constructed.
The report says consumers are also confused by the wide variety of energy advice they receive from government departments and MPs called on ministers to simplify the system.
Although energy consumption by households has started to fall, it is still 8% higher than it was in 1990 and is well below Dutch and Swedish levels.
Edward Leigh, the chairman of the public accounts committee, said: "The seemingly good news that household energy consumption fell between 2004 and 2007 is confounded by two sobering facts. One is that households in 2007 were still using 8% more energy than in 1990. The second is that household energy use will continue to rise, a function of the need for extra housing, rising expectations about how warm dwellings should be and an ever-rising use of electrical appliances.
"The hardest thing will be to persuade people to stop paying lip service to concerns about climate change, to change their behaviour and to enable them to take real steps, based on reliable advice, to make their homes much more energy-efficient."
Joan Ruddock, a minister in Miliband's department, said: "The report shows that our energy-efficiency programmes are working, with overall household energy use falling and millions of families saving money as a result. But we know there is still plenty of work to do, which is why our current programmes will see £3.8bn invested in energy-efficiency improvements by 2011.
"We're also consulting on methods of helping hard-to-treat homes, encouraging low-carbon heat generation, expanding home energy audits, and overcoming the financial barriers that can prevent householders from making the changes needed to reduce their energy use and carbon emissions."