Monday, 4 April 2022

Green Jobs Plan Will Help Deal With Rising Living Costs And Protect The Planet.

 

The Green Party has announced an ambitious plan to create jobs through retrofitting the UK’s poorly insulated housing stock.

 

As energy industry experts warn of another huge rise in bills in the Autumn the issue of how we pay to heat and light our homes is set to be a major issue at the local elections being held in May.

 

As the UK faces the most sustained fall in the standard of living since the fifties the party said in a statement to the press there has ‘never been a more important moment to elect Greens who will work hard to help their community deal with the cost-of-living crisis while tackling the climate emergency and reducing inequality [2]’.

 

The Green Party is calling for £25billion a year to be spent funding local councils to retrofit homes to make them more energy efficient saying this will ‘address the energy security and the cost-of-living crises, reduce carbon emissions, and create jobs all at the same time’.

 

Households have already been hit by a rise of £693 on April 1st, those with prepayment meters will see their bills rise by even more, an estimated £708 a year. This coincides with rises in council tax and water rates

 

Cornwall Insight published figures over the weekend predicting that the energy bill for a typical household could rise to £2600 in October.

 

Concern has been expressed by debt charities and energy companies that government support for people struggling to pay their bills does not go far enough. Children and older people, it is feared, will suffer health problems this winter through living in poorly heated homes [1].

 

The £25billion a year investment plan in retrofitting homes would, the Green Party say run for a decade, £2billion a year would be directed towards developing skills within the workforce to help with the transition to a net-zero economy [3].

 

Power would be devolved to local authorities to allow them to direct how funding for skills training schemes would be spent to better meet the specific needs in their area. Many of the new jobs would be created in the renewable energy sector, investment in which would be paid for by a 40% tax on polluting energy companies that would raising £5billion.

 

The party also wants to see it made easier for companies and individuals to recycle 100% of what they use and a move away from ownership to usership instead. This would see an increased use of carpools and community libraries for things like tools and equipment.

 

Scientists preparing a major report for the UN on climate change have advised that the world needs to move away from using fossil fuels over the next eight years to have a realistic chance of controlling the greenhouse gasses warming the planet [4].

 

Green Party spokesperson on Employment and Social Security Catherine Rowett said, “the time is ripe for a blossoming of the renewable energy sector, thriving on the creation of real jobs and clean industries fit for the 21st century”.

 

Adding that to pay for their ambitious plans the Greens would “tax pollution and wealth. That includes increasing the tax already charged on North Sea oil and gas to 40%, which would raise £5 billion and make polluters pay for their activities.”

 

Green Party councillors across the country were, she said, already “working to ensure that people will benefit from green jobs by creating training programmes, and by investing in renewable energy and energy efficiency. We’ll need a workforce ready to retrofit homes on a mass scale. Electing more Green councillors will speed up this revolution”.

 

[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60959357

[2]https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gRCJsr0yq1TrP9LlcQ_JWB17iUk_P6KiJlM2Tko4Yus/edit

[3]https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VU-AdxPNqItgIquQwavDE0DE8x_-aaw3LvCxjEMavuk/edit

[4] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-60959306

 

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