I repost his from the website of the Green New Deal Group, where it was published this morning:
Bringing skills and jobs to all parts of the UK could be achieved by a new proposal from the Green New Deal Group, which calls on the Chancellor Rishi Sunak to unveil a new, market leading ‘Green Recovery Bond' ISA this summer. The report, Green Recovery Bonds: Funding green homes for all, by Group members Colin Hines and Richard Murphy suggests that the tens of billions of pounds this could raise should be spent making all the UK's 30 million buildings energy efficient, creating jobs in every constituency.
Providing a secure, long term funding stream for energy efficiency and home retrofits is a priority, since buildings generate over a third of the UK's total greenhouse gas emissions. Green Recovery Bonds would not only be popular with older savers, offer good quality jobs for younger generations, and turbo charge the ‘levelling up' agenda by creating employment nationwide — they would also show the Government is finally getting serious about delivering on its climate targets in advance of November's Glasgow Climate Summit in November, due to end six months from today.
Professor Richard Murphy, a member of the Group and co-author of the report said “Simply fulfilling the promise made in this year's budget to launch an NS&I green savings bond should be seen as building on George Osborne's bond for retirees that in just five months in 2015 raised nearly £15bn. That bond offered higher returns than most other government backed saving vehicles and such was the demand for it that at one point the NS&I computer crashed. We would predict the same sort of reaction to the Green Recovery Bond that we are proposing.”
The Green New Deal Group's Green Recovery Bond would be open to all ages and be marketed as a tax-free, maximum £20,000 per year, cash ISA product. It is suggested that it should offer an initial interest rate ofat least1% for the first 5 years, with increasing rates the longer the funds are kept in the account. The Green Recovery Bond would as a result be more attractive than almost all cash ISAs currently available.
These bonds should also be made available to those savings via pension schemes and their existence should be widely publicised. This could prove extremely popular with risk averse pension investors seeking a social and green ESG savings option.
An ‘Offspring Green Recovery Bond' for Social Housing
For those wanting to save more than the £20,000 per annum an ‘Offspring Green Recovery Bond ISA' would allow savers to gift up to £3,000 per offspring per annum for their children or grandchildren. To help mitigate the increase in inequality between those with access to the ‘bank of mum and dad' to buy or rent property, all such ‘Offspring Green Recovery Bonds' would be used to improve existing and build more social housing.
Colin Hines, convenor of the Green New Deal group said “Prioritising making all the country's 30 million buildings energy efficient has for far too long been the Cinderella of energy policy. This will be a massive and transformational programme since to meet official UK Government target of net zero emissions by 2050 will require a carbon army of highly trained and managed personal making up to 20,000 properties a week energy efficient for the next 30 years”.
Additionally, at present more than 20 million homes are heated with gas and will need to have those heating systems replaced mostly by heat pumps, almost none of which are made in the UK at present. The future need for a million heat pumps installations a year will not only provide jobs in every community but must also be seen as the saviour of the UK steel industry.
Green New Deal Group member, Caroline Lucas MP, said “The potential for Green Recovery Bonds is huge. If the Government were to take up this one novel funding proposal, we could cut carbon emissions, address fuel poverty, gain the support of grateful savers and create jobs in every corner of the country, whilst rebooting manufacturing with a green purpose. This is the kind of climate leadership which will be essential if we are to achieve our emissions reduction targets, and to be credible hosts of the Climate Summit in six months' time”.
Read the full report: Green Recovery Bonds: Funding green homes for all
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Nice idea, which probably means it has no chance with the Tories.
Since 1979 this has been sacrificed, first on the alter of Thatcherism and then on the failures of both Labour and Tory Government’s to deliver on promise after promise to build new homes. One of the main reasons for that failure is that both gave in to the NIMBY’s once it got down to the nitty gritty planning stage. We now have a blue print to avoid this from Brexit. The lorry parks of Brexit in Kent were approved and building is happening regardless of local objections. Tory Brexit ideology has ridden roughshod over objections. If we can do it for lorry parks it can be done – nationally – for new homes. There is now no excuse.
We clearly do need new homes and in my view more social housing, especially to rent that is affordable. I also feel that we need to be more radical in our thinking of what that new housing should look like and be made from. There are loads of videos on YouTube of alternative types of housing. For example, mobile type homes are cheaper compared to brick ones and could be made to green specifications. We need to think outside of the box, something that I feel most Tories are incapable of I’m afraid.
No, nimby’s don’t block house building, developers do.
Every 15 years, district councils produce local plans which have to allocate sufficient land to meet ONS demand forecasts. Else the plans are either rejected by planning inspectors or rejected when developers appeal. But the responsibility for then delivering the houses lies with the councils, not the developers. So councils are forced into allocating lucrative green belt.
Councils specify that 30% of new housing is affordable (80% of market value). But developers decide whether this is “viable” and reduce the amount of affordable housing accordingly. Councils have to bypass the legal restrictions via their own private companies to build social housing.
The housing affordability crisis is due to a lack of social housing, and excessive lending by retail banks.
Funding is no problem. Spending the money wisely is.
If you allocate the money to homeowners then this is another windfall gain to the already well off. It could be clawed back from a tax on energy ratings however.
The trick will be to incentivise good behaviour and penalise the laggards.
The best way would be to allocate the funding to respectable housing associations /local authorities who could be financed to improve rented accommodation by buying up cheap accommodation, improving them and renting them out. New obligations on landlords for quality and investment might force a lot of sales of cheap property as would notice of an increase in capital gains taxes on property.
The other problem is that heat pumps are in short supply . They rely on expensive microchips chips which wear out quickly and skilled electricians are required to fit them. The UK has a shortage of skilled electricians, and no domestic heat pump or microchip manufacturing capacity. Incentives needs to be given to dealing with these supply problems otherwise the only beneficiaries of a move to heat pumps in the short term will be the existing skilled labour force and far eastern manufacturers.
Plus it makes no sense to move away from gas when the sunk investment has already been made, gas can be the source for cheaper energy sources using CHP systems (see CERES power) and the UK already has a declining resource which can be allowed to naturally decline.
The best way to clear the backlog of unbuilt houses would be to nationalise the landbanks carefully assembled by the big builders. An investigation by the Monoplies and Competition authority should first expose the racket and second recommend the sale of their property. The government should buy it with bonds and allocate it to local authorities and housing associations.
The bonds issued in 2015 are now earning 0.1% and because I failed to read the small print I didn’t cancel them in time so now I’m stuck with them for a full 12 months because NS&I removed the 90 day surrender clause.
Last year’s Government Green Homes Grant scheme was pulled half way through the process and I lost out yet again even though my application had been formally approved.
I guess I must be a born loser but how could we trust this horrendous government to use the money raised by such bonds for the purpose fir which they are intended? Would there be a legal duty to do so and would that have any effect with a government that breaks the law with impunity? (from a total novice!)
Hence the use of agencies that might stick to the law