The credibility of carbon free homes up and down the country has been put under national scrutiny this week as Gordon Brown’s government announced that only 24 buyers have taken advantage of a 2007 initiative put in place by the Prime Minister to instigate and attract the construction of environmentally friendly homes across the UK.
Mr Brown, in his final Budget as Chancellor, had announced that stamp duty would be scrapped on all new or developing properties worth up to £500,000 which achieve a zero carbon rating. Three years ago Mr Brown revelled in the press by concluded that the scheme would save an estimated average of £10,000 for each eco-home purchase. Deemed a key weapon in the fight against climate change, the then Chancellor set aside £15m for the tax relief.
It seems as though the now Prime Minister set himself for a great fall. Less than one carbon neutral home a month has sold since October 2007. Only a shocking 24 buyers have taken full advantage of the tax break since its initial introduction.
Grant Shapps, the shadow housing minister, had this to say: “Gordon Brown just can’t seem to stop himself from announcing grand schemes designed to do little other than grab that day’s headline.
“Rather than Ministers putting all their efforts into announcing glitzy pledges in order to grab a few column inches, it would be better for them to sit down and seriously work out ways to slash the 27 per cent of carbon emissions that emanate from Britain’s homes.”
With 2020 requisites looming, there is some weight to comments like these. However the tax break initiative found its roots in establishing and accelerating market interest for the national development eco-homes. Before October 2007, carbon neutral homes were scarcely heard of, let alone given column space in national newspapers. Despite the initiative’s serious lack of interest from a general buying market in a time of steady recession, the scheme has certainly succeeded in opening up the widening niche area of Green living.
Sarah McCarthy-Fry, the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, said the stamp duty land tax (SDLT) relief scheme was designed to “help kick-start the market for new highly efficient technologies in homes, both for the fabric of the building and in the use of micro-generation.”
Over the past three years there certainly has been a boom in micro-generational technologies, supporting grant schemes, development initiatives for connecting trades, as well as a steadily growing market for sales.
If the relief scheme can be perceived as a steamroller for what followed in terms of renewable energy development and carbon neutral design, then perhaps not all is lost.
Ms McCarthy-Fry continued: “We have always made it clear that the SDLT relief for zero carbon homes would evolve and we expect to see more of these homes built in the future.”
Despite recent press scrutiny, the Government remain committed to establishing an environmental policy that will see all new properties to be carbon-neutral by the year 2016. This would require a vast amount of new technology, which critics have already brought under financial consideration.
Further to these investigations, the eco-critics stand steadfast to the need for existing home sites to be brought into the carbon neutral generation before flagship developments go ahead.
