Summary of Jon Bird’s Dorset County Council presentation to Warm Homes for Health 16th July 2013, Islington, including references to useful new material:

• Partnerships are not the only form of joint working

• Partnerships are not always the best way of working together to make a difference

• Project-based groups are proving more dynamic and good for smaller, shorter term action.

• Dorset’s demographics are similar to those expected nationwide in 10-20 years, with a significant and growing proportion of older people.

• Dorset adopted widespread cavity wall construction in the 1880s

• Bournemouth, Dorset and Poole worked together to deliver many actions similar to those seen across England, (insulation and heating repairs, emergency heater loan, home “MOTs”, benefit take-up support, social inclusion and neighbourhood resilience actions, emergency cold packs, dedicated support for homeless and vulnerably housed people etc).

• Innovations included delivering a “lite” version of the Department of Health’s “9 cost effective interventions” alongside insulation and heating measures, and a “fund of last resort” to be used only when fuel supplier or local authority funding was not available for insulation and heating measures. (How to reduce the risk of seasonal excess deaths systematically in vulnerable older people to impact at population level, Dept of Health, page 8)

• While CERT funding was available, insulation was so cheap and cost effective, and housing data was so poor and relatively expensive it made sense to channel as much funding as possible toward insulation. The situation has now changed somewhat:

• Bulk EPC data gives us a clearer picture of about 1/3 of our housing stock

• There is official recognition of what many affordable warmth professionals already knew: “The clustering of fuel poverty in specific areas is uncommon …Targeting specific households …can be a more efficient means for targeting support” (fuel poverty, a framework for future action (DECC, 2013), p36) so focus less on area-based approaches.

• We have the first official attempts to quantify Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALYs) for affordable warmth interventions: A cavity wall insulation (CWI) or loft insulation (LI) measure produces approx 1/20th

of a QALY: So a QALY costs approximately £10,000 at £500 per insulation job. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) maximum threshold for a value for money QALY is £30,000.

• We have a tentative health value for affordable warm improvements: Approx £900 for CWI and LI.

• If you have the time look at section 5 and especially 6 of Fuel Poverty: a Framework for Future Action – Analytical Annex (DECC, July 2013). If you don’t just look at page 84

• Contact: j.bird@dorsetcc.gov.uk, 01305 221895