Meeting of the Parliament 27 January 2016
Last year, the number of excess winter deaths in Scotland was the highest in more than a decade—a staggering 4,060. “Excess winter deaths” is an uncomfortable phrase. It means the number of people who die during the winter months, compared to the average throughout the rest of the year. The World Health Organization suggests that at least 30 per cent of those 4,000 extra deaths can be attributed to cold, damp housing.
I say that simply to highlight how much fuel poverty matters. For some people, high bills are a source of annoyance; for others, they mean a real struggle to balance competing financial demands; for others still, they lead to choices that can prove fatal. The Existing Homes Alliance Scotland highlights that
“Spending time in a cold, damp house can aggravate conditions such as heart disease, strokes and flu and increase the risk of mental health problems.”
It also increases the risk
“of illness and death among older people, young children and those with a disability.”
As the Liberal Democrat motion before us this afternoon highlights, more than a third of Scottish households live in fuel poverty—that is, they need to spend more than 10 per cent of their income on gas, electricity or fuel bills. One in 10 is in extreme poverty—having to spend 20 per cent of their income just to keep warm. Those are damning figures.
When we look at the statistics in more detail, they are even more worrying. More than half of people affected are pensioners. More than 70 per cent live in social or private rented accommodation. As always, it is the most vulnerable in our society who suffer the most.
It was all so different 15 years ago. In 2001, the Liberal Democrat-Labour Administration led the way—while apparently winning support from the Scottish National Party—in saying that we could abolish that blight on our society and setting the target to end fuel poverty entirely by November this year. We were united in our expectation that our political commitment could make a real difference. How many of us could have predicted that, after nine years of SNP government, we would have gone into reverse and not abolished fuel poverty but increased it?
Nine years after coming to power, the SNP’s record is that a third of all Scots come home to a cold, damp house.