Today we welcome the scale and ambition of  the government’s Warm Homes Plan. This £15bn package to upgrade 5m homes and deliver 180,000 new jobs could make a real difference to millions of people struggling with their energy bills. If delivered properly, this is the biggest public investment in home energy upgrades in British history.

It’s encouraging to see an offer for everyone with a scale up of targeted interventions for those on low incomes, upgrades for social housing, new protections for renters, and grants or loan finance available for all households who want to upgrade their homes.

But questions remain,  particularly on how low-income households in areas without access to Warm Home: Local or Warm Home: Social grants will receive support after the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) ends in March.

Warm Homes Agency

We applaud the £1.5b allocated to set up the new Warm Homes Agency and its ambition to simplify scheme delivery, improve consumer protections and provide information and advice to households.

In designing the new Warm Homes Fund, it’s essential that lessons are learnt from the Green Homes Grant, which the National Audit Office (NAO) found cost £1,000 per home to deliver. The Warm Homes Agency will need to ensure that householders receive high-quality impartial advice about the measures they plan to install, receive checks on the installation to ensure it is fitted correctly, and receive advice once the measures have been installed. This will ensure they get the most from their new technologies and can access the cheapest tariff available to them.

We know centralised advice provided through a national online and phone service, as set out in the plan, is far from sufficient to underpin scheme delivery and build consumer trust. 

The strength of local advice

Independent and locally delivered advice is central to building confidence in the retrofit market. We’ve seen this through Retrofit West, set up by CSE in partnership with the West of England Mayoral Combined Authority to support local households and communities, and build the local retrofit supply chain for the region.

As such, we welcome the recognition by the government of the need to link to existing local retrofit schemes and advice providers, and the commitment to deliver the Warm Homes Fund in partnership with mayors, local authorities and local partners, but more clarity and detail is needed on when and how this will be achieved.

Retrofit supply chains

We welcome the intention to ensure, through the use of public procurement conditions, that new Warm Homes funding from April 2026 supports the workforce whose livelihoods have been affected by the imminent closure the Energy Company Obligation (ECO). But these conditions need to be implemented urgently. The passing of ECO has already hit the retrofit market and supply chain hard; many installers are facing closure, some have already shut down and 10,000 to 20,000 jobs are thought to be at risk. The industry needs clarity about top-up funding allocations and access to these new supply chains.

The government’s plans for devolution represent a huge opportunity to drive economic growth and create retrofit jobs, and its reassuring to see mayors and new strategic authorities may have a key role. Many unitary and district councils are already delivering Warm Homes: Local grants successfully, others have failed to secure Warm Homes grants or deliver successfully. The government needs a better solution for local areas that fall outside the devolution priorities or don’t have strong existing local delivery. Mayoral authorities taking on delivery of retrofit schemes for the first time need to work in partnership and learn from those with strong existing programmes. Any major changes in local scheme delivery risk disruption to the fledgling market and existing supply chains.   

Recognising community groups

Across the UK, community groups are trusted voices playing an increasingly important role in supporting households to retrofit their homes, reduce energy use, cut carbon emissions and lower their bills. Aside from recognising the role community energy groups can play on shared ownership models for solar, batteries and renewable infrastructure, we are disappointed not to see more support for community groups who want to improve delivery of home energy retrofit in their area. Schemes like Green Open Homes have demonstrated how communities can play a fundamental role in building consumer trust and scaling-up local retrofit.

Heat Zones

We welcome the ambition for heat networks, with a clear target to double heat demand met via heat networks in England by 2035, backed by £195m a year through the Green Heat Network Fund.

It’s good to see recognition that heat networks are part of the solution for delivering low carbon affordable heat to fuel poor households, and that strong consumer protections are in development.

However, local authorities will become Zone Coordination Bodies – a crucial delivery role – and they need more support to make this work. CSE is developing tools to support both government policy and local authority delivery in this area.

Making it work

This is a significant moment for UK retrofit. The government has put serious money and ambition on the table, but the proof will be in the delivery.

We need urgent clarity on how support will reach low-income households after the ECO ends. We need quality standards and consumer protection built in from the start. We need to back the local advice providers and community groups already doing this work on the ground.

CSE is ready to support the government in getting this right. The potential is there to create tens of thousands of jobs, support the move away from gas and towards more renewable energy, and help millions of households. Now, we need action and delivery mechanisms that matches ambition.