Chamber and committees

I ask Stephen Garvin whether that is being explored in those terms.

I ask David Blair to jump in again.

Again, I will turn to officials for an answer to that question.

As I said in my previous response, the committee will be aware that the single building assessment process needs to be undertaken to identify where we believe changes need to be made. David Blair might want to come in here and say whether there has been any assessment of the numbers.

I put it to the member that that is a slight overreaction to the measures in the bill. Pre-action protocols are already standard practice; they are required in the social rented sector and we have been told that they are best practice in the private rented sector. As for making repossession grounds discretionary, none of that prevents any landlord from seeking repossession; it means only that their circumstances and those of their tenant will all be taken into account when the decision is made.

Will the member take an intervention?

I am sure that Mr Griffin knows that we already have a very active programme of work in this area and we have already announced significant expansions of it over the course of this year in response to the cost of living crisis.

Responding to the crisis this year, we boosted support through our long-standing programmes, which have already supported over 150,000 households that were in, or at risk of being in, fuel poverty. We are widening the eligibility criteria for the £55 million warmer homes Scotland fuel poverty programme, which will provide an offer of support to over 7,500 households this year.

We are also increasing the level of funding for individual fuel-poor households through the £64 million local authority-led, area-based schemes, and we are expanding the Home Energy Scotland advice service to help households to keep their homes warmer and reduce bills. There is capacity to support an extra 12,000 households a year, and we are doubling the offer to vulnerable households.

Mark Griffin is correct in saying that energy efficiency is one of the most urgent things that we need to do, so I hope that he will join me in calling on the UK Government to revise its woefully inadequate energy security strategy, which says nothing at all about energy efficiency.

It is a matter of fact that the powers to regulate energy markets remain reserved. For example, the proposal for a £1,000 cut to energy bills that came forward from the Scottish Power chief executive in his recent interview is deliverable only through the powers that rest with the UK Government. We have repeatedly called on it to take other actions, including a temporary cut in energy bills through VAT, a review of the levies on bills, action on the warm home discount scheme and the creation of a four-nations discussion to develop an effective response to the energy bill increases.

The Scottish Government is disappointed that the UK Government has failed to support hard-pressed households and to engage with us multilaterally to achieve more, such as could be achieved with a one-off windfall tax on excessive profits in the oil and gas industry or anywhere else. That scale of work is needed, and I hope that the UK Government feels that it is not too late to change direction and listen to such proposals.

Energy costs lie at the heart of the cost of living crisis, and this Government is committed to doing everything in our powers to support those who need it. That includes the £150 cost of living award to support households with higher fuel costs, but also the further £10 million that is being provided to continue our fuel insecurity fund.

We are set to invest almost £770 million this year to tackle cost of living pressures through family benefits and other unique social security payments. Crucially, we are also committed to investing at least £1.8 billion over the next five years in heat and insulation for Scotland’s homes and buildings, with programmes already being enhanced and increased.

More needs to be done. Powers relating to energy markets sit at the UK level, and we have repeatedly urged the UK Government to take urgent and decisive action to support households in both the immediate and longer terms, such as a one-off windfall tax on companies that have benefited from significantly higher profits during the pandemic and the energy crisis, and the temporary removal of VAT from energy bills.

We are actively engaging with the sector and stakeholders—for example, through the Scottish energy advisory board, of which the chief executive of Scottish Power is a member—to explore what more can be done. We believe that all four nations should be involved in planning to address the crisis, which affects people throughout the UK.

In my previous answer, I gave several examples of how we have expanded and are continuing to expand not only the eligibility for but the scale of our support to households who face fuel poverty—and to all of Scotland in the transition to renewable heat as well as to high energy efficiency. Mark Griffin knows, I think, that we are committed to doing that at as big a scale and as fast a pace as we can. However, to achieve that throughout Scotland is a multidecade task that cannot be compressed into the space of a few months.

I am quite happy to write to the member with any other information that he requires about our ambitious programme of work in that area. I hope that colleagues on the Scottish Labour benches will work with us constructively—not demanding the impossible, but pushing us to go as far and as fast as we can. We are committed to doing that, for which, I hope, we have the support of the whole Parliament.