UNDEROCCUPANCY AND FUEL POVERTY

Introduction

A household is defined as being in underoccupancy when:

• there is more than twice the minimum floor area per person specified in the Parker Morris Standard AND
• there is at least one surplus bedroom (however small) once the Bedroom Standard has been met.

The Parker Morris standard allows 33m² for the first occupant, and an average of 13m² for each additional person. The Bedroom Standard assumes a separate bedroom for a co-habiting couple, anyone over 21, and gender-segregation when there are children over 10 years, with a maximum of two persons per bedroom.

Importance for Fuel Poverty Reduction

Because the dwelling is relatively large, a household in underoccupancy needs to pay more for the fuel needed to meet the Standard Heating Regime. However, unlike income and energy efficiency, the general relationship between fuel poverty and underoccupancy is weak, perhaps because larger homes tend to be associated with higher-income households.

Underoccupancy becomes particularly important when there is little scope for remedial energy efficiency work, household income is low and the required fuel spend is, as a consequence, disproportionately high.The graph below shows the effect of a household, comprising three people, moving from underoccupancy (120 m²) to a higher density. In this range of disposable income (£5500 – £7750 pa) and around average SAP (49), successful intervention into underoccupancy alone could clearly make a dramatic difference to fuel poverty status.

Current National Policy

Within the social housing sector, allocation policy usually pre-empts underoccupancy at the initial letting stage. However, changes in household composition can alter this over time. Guidelines have been issued by DTLR for social landlords on the management of underoccupancy but there is no evidence so far of this being applied on a significant scale.

There are no policies or procedures regarding underoccupancy in the private sector, although the issue is recognised in the Government's Fuel Poverty Strategy Document (2001).

NEA's View

Whilst energy efficiency improvements, coupled with effective advice on fuel tariffs, energy management, welfare benefits and financial services remain the key planks of a fuel poverty reduction strategy, NEA recognises the potential of an active approach to underoccupancy, with the priority being households on the lowest incomes. At the same time, it is understood that affordable energy costs are rarely the main priority for householders in making a decision to stay put or to move.

NEA recommends:

• research into the experience of fuel-poor households in underoccupancy in the private sector, particularly into their awareness and relative prioritisation of cold homes issues, perceptions of barriers to moving when they would like to and the types of help which might be required and how much this might cost.
• a set of small projects, working in partnership with local agencies testing out some of the avenues suggested by this research, followed by a wider, nationally-funded underoccupancy strategy for the private sector should these approaches prove successful and affordable.
• investigation of current strategy and activity among a range of social landlords to assess the actual and potential impact of current policy and guidelines.

Underoccupancy and Fuel Poverty (2 pages /77 kb)

Reviewed: 17/03/2005