Heated exchanges in Offaly row on retroffitted homes

SOME people who have installed air to water heap pump systems in their homes have been shocked by the electricity bills, a meeting of Offaly County Council was told.

Cllr Clare Claffey said she had heard of a man who could not afford to pay his bill so he was staying in bed from Monday to Wednesday.

The Social Democrats representative was reacting to an increase in the number of houses in Offaly which had been retrofitted to improve their insulation and make them more energy efficient.

“That's fantastic, air to water[heat pump], and everything is great, except that he now cannot afford the electricity,” said Cllr Claffey.

Previously, added the Banagher councillor, the man might have been able to have heat from his stove or cook on a stove but “he mentioned something about cornflakes a couple of times a day”.

She said: “I just thought that was really, really sad” and asked if anyone was checking that people could afford the new heating system before it was installed.

Cllr Harvey, Fianna Fail, asked if it was policy that all council houses in Offaly would have heat pumps.

“I've heard horror stories of the electricity bills afterwards that are unreal,” said the Tullamore councillor.

The council's housing official, John Cunningham, said up to 80 residential units had been completed under the retrofitting programme and “we haven't had any complaints”.

Mr Cunningham said the retrofitting followed a “fabric first” approach where the insulation on the house must be considered first.

He agreed there had been horror stories. “The heat pump will not work unless the house is properly insulated,” he said.

“Where people have taken out boilers and just replaced them with heat pumps... they create horror stories and give the thing a bit of a bad name.”

However, he also pointed out that energy prices in general were rising. “While the price of electricity is increasing, the price of solid fuel is also increasing. The price of oil is also increasing so it is a relative calculation.”

Overall, he said the council's experience from its retrofitting programme was that the heat pump solution was “positive” and among other things, it eliminated the hard work of carrying ashes around.

The longer term benefit was that the pumps were the solution “in order to be sustainable”.

Sharon Kennedy, director of service, said that council tenants were not compelled to have their houses retrofitted.

“If they are not of a mind to co-operate with the scheme it's not forced upon them,” said Ms Kennedy.

Cllr John Leahy said anyone getting a new house under the council social housing programme was doing very well because they were getting a home with an A energy rating which would cost between €260,000 and €280,000.

The Independent member said that was “fantastic” but a private borrower would have to be on a salary of €80,000 to be able to afford a mortgage for a similarly priced house.

The Kilcormac councillor said the average annual disposable income for an Offaly person was between €30,000 and €55,000 and many of them were on the council housing waiting list too but did not qualify for help.

“So we've a whole cohort of people that we can do nothing about in this chamber. That's where the real crisis is,” said Cllr Leahy.

A member of Fine Gael, Cllr Noel Cribbin, hit out at Cllr Claffey, saying he believed the Government was doing a “brilliant job” and had announced a lot of aid for people affected by cost of living rises.

The Edenderry councillor joined the meeting of the council by a Zoom link from Australia.

“A big hello to you all from the sunny south of Australia here. 24 degrees here today and I have the shades on me today,” said Cllr Cribbin.

He said many factors were making it difficult to resolve the housing crisis, including “Putin” and “Covid” but Offaly was nonetheless on course to exceed its target for social housing provision.

Addressing Cllr Claffey and “that poor unfortunate person who wanted to stay in bed all day”, he said the Government in the “biggest budget ever in the history of the State” had ensured 1.4 million houses would be helped with double payments, assistance for living alone and €600 in ESB credits.

He said of the individual referred to by Cllr Claffey: “If he's living alone he's on over €300 a week. So there should be enough money there to pay an ESB bill.”

Cllr Cribbin said it was “amazing” that anyone could find fault with retrofits and echoed Cllr Leahy's point about the cost of providing new energy efficient social homes.

“People on social welfare are getting them for €40 or €50 a week,” he remarked.