Citizens' Jury - Retrofit

My motivation to join the Citizens' Jury was because I am interested in the housing that I live in. I want to sustain that for my children and the future population that is going to live in my house.

Well, I have always been worried about climate crisis, so I came mainly for that reason. Also, I want to retrofit, I want to buy a heat pump and to know a lot more about that. I wanted to get involved to understand more about retrofit and how it was going to roll forward in Calderdale.

I have really enjoyed the process from all the workshops and online sessions that I have attended. It has been really great and we want to be proud of what we are going to start in Calderdale here.

The process has been fantastic. I have met some fantastic people. It has really been quite inspirational to know that we can all move forward together.

What I hope for the future of retrofit within our communities is that it is inclusive. It includes everyone and, you know, benefits society in general.

I want to make sure that people in Calderdale understand that retrofit is for everybody. That really, it is important that we move forward with that.

I hope that in the future the community will take on retrofitting their properties. That they will recognise that collectively there are things we can do. I am really, really excited about what is going to happen in Calderdale with regard to the retrofit.

Julie Thorpe, CEO and Centre Manager at Todmorden Learning Centre and Community Hub:

I'm just going to say a few words at the beginning.

Most of this evening is going to be taken up by the wonderful members of our citizens' jury who are going to present to you the findings and recommendations that they came up with.

But we wanted to set the context a little bit for why did we do this thing? This thing you're going to hear about later. In Calderdale we have known about the climate emergency since before anybody called it that.

We've known about extreme weather and changing weather patterns. We've known about the impact that that can have on people's lives and people's homes, people's workplaces. I imagine that there are a number of people in the room who have had first-hand experience of being flooded to one extent or the other. Everybody who lives in Calderdale knows about what happens when those extreme weather events occur. And so, Calderdale Council, I think we're all very proud of for taking a real lead towards a net zero emissions target of reaching net zero by 2038 and I know that it's something that the people of Calderdale are really behind the Council in the actions towards that.

One of the biggest contributors to our carbon emissions in this borough and it's partly to do with the climate and the nature of the housing stock, is the built environment. It's our homes and the way we heat them and the extent to which you have to try and heat them to keep them warm and dry. The statistics are that, well, 69,000, 70,000, 75,000, I think we're at 75,000 now, haven't we, Richard? It's crept up,

They've counted again. I think it's probably some of Laura's work, she knows how many more, we've got more data which is really fantastic. 75,000 homes in Calderdale need to be improved to bring them up to the very most basic acceptable energy efficiency level so EPC C, which is not wonderful but at least it would mean a significant reduction from where we are at the moment.

We know how to do it.

There's already lots of solutions out there. We've learnt a lot by trial and error, I think, both in the councils' building works sections, in local construction companies and in other people who are taking more alternative routes towards retrofit as well.

We know that the best thing to do is insulate. That's the first step for all our properties. After that, there are other things that we can do.

We can change the heating systems. We can get away from gas and move towards green fuels. So we know all that, why isn't it happening?

Nobody seems to be able to come up with an answer to that question and a couple of years ago we had a meeting to look at a funding bid which became a partnership between it was Sam and then Richard from the council and ourselves at Tod College and the Carbon Coop.

If you’ve not met the Carbon Coop, you can talk to them later. We applied for and were successful in getting funding from Innovate UK as part of a Net Zero Fast Followers program.

It's a funding program with solutions to the climate emergency. And the funding was for a research project to look at what are the non-technical barriers to retrofit?

What are the things that stop people from doing it? Why isn't it happening? And more to the point, what can we do to overcome those barriers? Where are we changing? How do we move things forward?

And so, we arranged a citizen's jury and this was I think the first for Calderdale. I know that other parts of the country have had citizens' juries looking at various aspects of particularly of the climate crisis, but we think this is the first time anybody's looked specifically at the issues around retrofit. And certainly, it's the first here. So, over the course of October, November and almost into December, a panel of 26 people came together. They made a huge time commitment, full Saturdays, spent locked up in a room in the Imperial Hotel, opposite the station, with some mediocre grub. Compared to tonight.

But, you know and they did a lot of listening, a lot of talking. And what you're going to hear this evening is the outcome of all that work.

So just at this point, I want to take the opportunity to thank those people. It was only people who were really, really sick who didn't manage to drag themselves there.

The level of attendance was absolutely amazing the level of engagement in the sessions was way beyond what we'd expected and I think lots of people by the end were saying oh god I know so much about it now I just want to know more. The big question is where do we take it now and that's when we want to try and answer a little bit at the end I know most of the jurors have said that they really, really want to see this moved forward.

They're going to, in collective and individual capacities, they're going to be on your back, Calderdale Council. They're going to be on your back, West Yorkshire Combined Authority.

They're going to be on your back, Westminster Government, because they've identified some ways in which you can really help. It's not all down to you, though and nobody's saying that.

So, you know, don't take that with the bucks being passed now. It isn't that simple. But there are certainly things that we hope that we'll get taken forward.

So, without further ado, the big question that we set the jury was how can we make Calderdale homes warmer, healthier and cheaper to heat?

Recommendation one: Establish a viable, integrated and physical One Stop Shop area model for Calderdale.

I wanted to join the jury because I spent many years working in environment and housing policy, so I know what needs to happen.

But when it came to my own property, it wasn't that simple, because I looked at fixing advice and I didn't have the money to risk in that kind of investment.

So that's why I joined and that's why this first recommendation is very important for me. It's to establish a viable, integrated and physical one stop shop area model in Calderdale. I just explain very quickly because that’s a lot of words there. So, one stop shop we felt it should be a network of trusted advisors linked to a network of trusted suppliers and underpinned by a quality assurance scheme.

It would need to offer everything from information, how to process it all the way to Project Management. It would need to be viable means it needs a funding commitment.

Integrating means it has to be linked to local services, including health and regional activity. And physical, we heard that the West Yorkshire Combined Authority would be the ones to offer online support, but we've really felt very strongly that it needs to be face-to-face in a trusted place.

Recommendation two: Retrofit products and materials to be VAT (value-added tax) exempt.

The key reasons for wanting to join the Jury is to create a sustainable environment and take active steps to create a healthy, sustainable future for my children and for other children in the area.

This recommendation is about retrofit materials to be VAT exempt. It's a bit of a no brain, really, and it kind of applies to the time we can help with the new-build properties.

At the end of the day, we're encouraging people to knock down the properties and build a new, which completely goes against the strategy. We should be, you know, reusing the fabric.

Recommendation three: Develop a local retrofit standard to guarantee the availability of a high-quality, equitable, circular, local supply chain.

My particular recommendation that I'm talking about is to develop a local retrofit standard to guarantee the availability of high quality equitable circular level supply chain.

And why I think that's important, it's important that we have a well-established and highly capable supply chain defending its Calderdale businesses and Calderdale residents.

And one that serves the needs from advice materials, purposeful training, local jobs, quality control and auditing and end to end everything.

Recommendation four: Develop an archetypes guidebook for retrofit of different types of houses.

I joined the citizen's jury to increase my knowledge of the do's and don'ts of achieving net zero carbon efficiency in my property. The citizen's jury understands that the development of an archetype guidebook is being put together by Calderdale and is already in progress for the purpose of retrofit in different types of architectural houses. The project should be funded by central government and the West Yorkshire Combined Authority, providing financial support for the development and implementation of the guide.

Promotion of a retrofit scheme. The guide will serve as a starting point for promoting retrofit schemes to the public, helping them to understand the benefits and processes involved.

Recommendation five: 0% interest retrofit loans with match funding loans to be made available.

In terms of why I join the jury, it was because I think it a really interesting way for the council to open the avenues to genuinely engage its citizens. When we were looking at the jury one of the significant barriers we found was finance and how to build instruments that are genuinely equitable.

And that means in terms of, not just in terms of levels of decoration, but also in terms of intergenerational. So we feel that we need 0% interest retrofit loans, because then people find debt to be at risk and they won't incur it so we need to change the risk-benefit ratio in favour of people being able to spread the risk over time and improve their buildings.

We believe that we also need to lobby central government because we need a lot of match funding loans for this. The number of people we need to take these up needs to be much more significant than most people will just endure. So, our concern is to lobby central government, use the loans that are available such as the sovereign loan fund levy, the energy suppliers to actually match fund and to then the local authority to keep the financial list of spend to further some of the other instruments.

Recommendation six: Coordinate the development of both One Stop Shops and Area Based Schemes in localised areas to achieve momentum, scale, speed and equity.

This is an existential, really important problem. My background is in disability and social policy. I want to join the jury to learn and also hopefully to make a difference in whatever way I can.

This one is about coordinating development, increasing one-stop shops and also developing area-based schemes, by which we mean groups of households collaborating together on retrofit, because it's cost-effective and more efficient to do so.

And our recommendation how to facilitate that. So, we're looking to the council for leadership in this and one spot shops to create really visible examples of collaboration that people can see.

We were really fortunate on the journey. We learned, for example, about successful schemes in our areas, such as in Levenson, where the carbon co-op and the authorities, have groups of people to replicate this in their houses.

We need these kinds of things too in Calderdale. We feel that really clear leadership is needed from the authorities. It's very difficult to do that. It's not isolated, but we're individuals in a sense of homeowners in a way of people and other household situations aren't.

And that's why we need leadership. For example, the local area plan to identify areas which funds community engagement. So, people have to know about this as a possibility and identify places where to take part.

Secondly, to develop archetypes. So how we can do this, you know, models if you like, how we can retrofit specific kinds of housing and agree with pre-affirmed planning.

Recommendation seven: Detailed surveys carried out by independent assessors.

Now the headline on my recommendation is, under heading, Surveying, detailed surveys to be carried out by independent assessors.

Recommendations of this jury are mainly aimed at owner-occupiers, not people in social houses because they cannot choose or not choose to retrograde their properties.

Therefore, they would mainly be self-funded their own retrofit measures, so, they need high quality, independent, unbiased assessors, to come to their homes who are not going to financially benefit from the recommendations they are given.

Recommendation eight: Pre-approved planning permission for retrofit measures and listed property guidance.

So, my recommendation is Pre-approved planning permission for retrofit measures and listed property guidance. I feel like there's two prongs to this one. So, I think in general, there's a little bit of a barrier for homeowners in understanding what is permitted development and what is planning permission that comes to retrofitting those and retrofitting measures. The second prong to this is obviously listed properties. I'm very passionate about that particularly because I'm living in one. But I do find that it's very difficult for owners of listed properties to really get going on their retrofit journey, even more, because a lot of the time what things are permitted in the normal house aren't for a listed property. But really it is quite essential for the council to publish guidance around what measures are appropriate and suitable for listed buildings specific to the Calderdale area and crucially to provide pre-approval to certain retrofit measures where appropriate.

Recommendation nine: A campaign to raise awareness, encourage and assist all audiences to start their retrofit journey.

I have an 18th century farmhouse stone built. It's a bit too big in terms of putting solar panels on the roof and stuff. I've got insulation work, it's been really positive.

Why I wanted to get involved with this, partially my friend Imogen did a retrofit on their house, I found it very interesting. My company also deals with home renovation projects.

So, I'm going into people's properties and recommending beautiful things, are aesthetically pleasing, functionally great, but not for the fabric of the building so much. So that's been really interesting for me.

I think my topic, my recommendation is an awareness campaign to raise the awareness, encourage and assist all audiences to start their retrofit journey. Without this point, all the fine detail, which is discussed later on, becomes quite difficult to push forward.

The thing about getting people's awareness is educating them to problems that they might have in their house, how to deal with them effectively and to actually make them more comfortable for themselves. The wider piece is to spread the knowledge of climate change and reaching net zero to benefit ourselves, our families, their families, and beyond, and in fact, making the world a safer place to live in.

As we pointed out, it's a very community-based thing. It's a very diverse sector that we're dealing with across Calderdale. With many different communities within and that's why the campaign really needs to come through the schools, churches, religious buildings, doctor surgeries and so on and actually trying to get communities involved and get the communities to take action.

Recommendation ten: Calderdale has the potential to renewably generate significant amounts of its own power.

The recommendation is related to the local generation of renewable energy. We can and we should save as much energy as we can through improving the energy efficiency of our properties, but we still need to generate energy.

When you look, Calderdale has already done quite a number of projects and gave recognitions for these. Scaling up is the next challenge and more proactive publicity, using real examples, will encourage individuals, businesses and community groups to become involved.

Could Calderdale help householders by sourcing solar panels and reduced rates for a cooperative with householders? Publicity through libraries and public spaces such as the Piece Hall, looking at planning for local small-scale wind generators. The council can't fund retrofit on its own, but it can be a major trusted facilitator and disseminator of real-life examples and lessons

Recommendation eleven: Retrofit funding through grants and subsidies using tax thresholds as caps.

I'm actually a gas service engineer by trade. So I was really interested in this because it gave us non-biased, informed choices that we can make in our homes.

So, the subject I got is retrofit funding through grants and subsidies using tax thresholds as caps. So, there is funding out there, but for the average working family and pensioners, they're not eligible.

These haven’t been reviewed for a very long time, so we discussed is there an opportunity to maybe use the tax thresholds or could they be done square frontage of houses?

The other thing was where do you start, so how much would it cost for your house? Do you have to pay to have assessments done, EPCs, could the government pay for that?

Recommendation twelve: Wider use of green mortgages for retrofit funding at preferential rates.

This project enables public to be healthier by living in their warm and dry homes and reduce the damage to the environment caused by heating properties.

I've got the recommendation green mortgages for retrofit funding at preferential rates.

Why is it important to me?

If a property is well maintained and future-proofed, that's with regards to climate change and rising energy costs, then it is a much safer investment for the bank.

The property is far less likely to lose value, the house owner is less likely to end up in negative equity and with lower energy bills, it is less likely that the property owners will run into financial difficulty every winter.

Recommendation thirteen: Produce a communication strategy to assist Calderdale residents in joining the retrofit journey, with a toolkit to guide communications and to share regionally for greater impact.

I'm always engaged in the community at all levels. I work in a lot of deprived areas and lots of different people and I'm actually exposed to a lot of homes and there's lots of houses that are not up to scratch and not warm, especially in the elderly communities. So, I find that this kind of information is very vital for everyone to be engaged in. All these things in Calderdale, really need an obvious improvement.

It won’t be done if people are not engaged and a lot of my community hardly know everything about it. Since I've been on this journey I've been talking about it to lots of people and people don't know where to start, they don't know where to go, even though there's a lot of information that I've found out on this jury service workshop.

It's not out there. We need a lot of people to be passionate about it, talk about it and it can get out there. People will think about it, and if we've got support with my colleagues that's just spoken now, we need all that time together, but it's getting people to let the community stand in somebody and say, right, we need to get going so we can all get together.

So, I think having lots of championships from younger ages to university to working families that are just trying to pass by and develop the audience getting engaged and tapping into all these wonderful resources that are out there but that we don't even know about and hopefully we can get those colder houses a little bit more healthier and warmer.

Recommendation fourteen: There needs to be clear communication of the Council’s vision of net zero in 2038 and the role of the retrofit strategy within it.

Citizens' jury, like the citizens' assembly, are wonderful things, because they are a democracy in action. My recommendation says there is to be clear communication of the Council's vision of net zero in 2038 and the strategy to get there. They are a few different objectives to retrofit strategy.

And as Richard pointed out you know you've got to make houses warm, make them healthier, make them cheaper to run and reduce the emissions. These overlap which is great to make it politically acceptable, we all want some of that, but also there are there are tensions between them, they're not always leading to the same actions.

So it's just important to look at certain cons of talking about the different objectives and different groups of people. And there's also unintended consequences that could come about.

For example, if you're just stressed, we're doing this to save money. There can be unintended consequences when we're just doing it. So really it's just thinking about which objectives, which communication strategy is important with different people.

And that different people will need to respond to different things. It does not work on the same thing, for the same person. Thirdly, there does need to be, it's an ongoing process of communication of strategy.

And I received an annual review of something on it today. So it did happen but it does need to be ongoing.

Deborah Harkins – Director of Public Health – Calderdale Council:

I have just learned so much just from that and that presentation and so I'm going to answer the questions, that's my job, isn't it? So, the first question about, can the council play a role in communicating and lobbying for implementation of recommendations to regional and national government and other relevant agencies?

So I am the director of the council that leads on climate action. I'm conscious, the leader of the council’s here, the cabinet member for climate action is here as well.

I think the short answer, I hope you agree, is yes. The council can play a role in communicating and lobbying to implement the recommendations I think it's a really simple answer. Influencing is a really key theme about our climate action plan and actually our cabinet endorsed influencing strategy just before Christmas I believe or very recently, which sort of sets out the things we want to influence the things us having a common line as a council but also as a strategy around key priorities. One of those priorities is related to retrofit and I think there's a real opportunity in that so that's very much about us having a common voice, really confident, really curious about what our asks are and I think the fantastic feedback and thoughts and reflections that we've had from you.

Give us an opportunity to add some depth to the influencing asks in the retrofit bit of our influencing strategies. You can be assured that through the Climate Action partnership will take that away and have a look at what that means for the influencing strategy. And I think the other thing is, you know, when we are influencing, when we are talking to the combined authority which we are influencing, the Yorkshire and Humber Climate Commission, Councillor Patient and I are both involved in. And government, when we tell them that these aren't things we dreamt, but actually a citizen's jury has really deliberated on these issues and this has come from our communities, from our citizens that will give extra weight I think to the messages so thank you. And that collective voice that having the voice together when we say something that being reinforced that being things that other people in Calderdale are saying again, is really powerful I think, so thank you for that.

The second question, which is how they align with the work of the council and how will the council consider them as priorities for the future? I mean, just first of all, retrofitting is a priority for the council. It's really challenging but it is a priority for us already and, you know, the insight that you've given us is really helping us think about that.

We've got Richard sat there in my head the king of retrofits, in my world, so I'm looking straight at him so it is a priority for him. I think this has really helped for us. I think we've also got in our climate action partnership we've got our warm and resilient buildings group and again they are working on fair retrofits strategies for Calderdale and I think some of the some of the points that you made about trust around people having their trusted relationship, trusted advice, some of the things you talked about, about that sliding scale in terms of getting additional contributions.

I think there are all things that need to fit into that fair retrofit strategy. So again, you can be assured that we'll take your recommendations away and think about how they fit into that fair retrofit strategy.

I know you already know about the local energy plan and again Laura the queen of local energy plans is out there so you saw you've seen what that local energy plan does it gives us that really technical evidence-based information about you know warmer resilient homes or lack of, and the challenge if you like it. I think what you've done has really enhanced that and bring together with the technical stuff some real deliberations, some real thoughts and real reflections about how we bring that to life, what that might mean, what some of the options are, in a way that the data alone will never do.

You know, your people that care about this and that have really reflected on it in Calderdale. So it just brings it to life in a way that that data never will be on its own. We've obviously got things about the Street Demonstrator Project which we talked about, didn't we, as well.

And we've still got work to do on the engaging and the willing to pay in terms of the retrofit. I'm absolutely reading from my notes and my help that I add by saying that we're doing, we also have an element of our climate action plan which is about community climate action and that's very much about developing neighbourhood climate action plans.

And some of the stuff you said about needing groups of people sometimes to work together. I think there's a real opportunity for us to explore that through those community-powered neighbourhood climate action plans.

We're actually putting a bid in for some funding, really, at the moment, around working with probably two or three communities to actually look at that. And I am busy to retrofit a bit, so they'll start reading that.

So thank you for that as well. I'm talking too much now. Finally, are there any surprises with the recommendations or is there anywhere we'd want a more key recommendation?

And again, just to say, I love Citizens’ Jurys. I have been involved in quite a number of them. So I've learned one thing, well, I've learned a lot, but one thing generally, to all of them, never be surprised by how rich and how brilliant the ideas are, how you learn from everyone.

So in a way I've learned not to be surprised. I think there's some incredibly important stuff here that I've not thought, lots that I've not thought about and that I've learned. But I am never surprised because I know how the opportunity to really deliberate with people with real talent and passions.

I think there's quite a lot we'd want to talk about further though. I think it's a... So things like how we communicate, I'm always signing up press releases and with Councillor Patients for stuff about our climate action plan, about our work on net zero.

I think we talk about it though, that is such helpful feedback that we could do that better. We'd love to talk to you about how we do that better, how we communicate about the climate better and about the plan. We've already got thoughts in our Community Climate Action Plan theme about green hubs, advice hubs, which link a lot with the recommendation. I'd really love to talk to you about that, making sure that things were developed into our Climate Action Plan fit with your vision for that. Lots of things. I mean, I think we'd really love to keep talking to you about this.

Richard Armitage, Healthy Homes Service Manager at Calderdale Council:

I'm certainly learning a lot myself as I go on this journey through my day-to-day employment and working on projects like this with volunteers and committed individuals who have been part of this Jury. So thank you ever so much for volunteering. Thank you ever so much for giving up your time on weekends. Thank you for listening to the expert with us as well who all contributed to this process and thank you very much to Imogen and Julie for organising a wonderful evening. I've certainly taken a lot from it.

Lots of lessons for me personally and challenges in terms of my role and how I incorporate these lessons into my work and future projects going forward. So, on behalf of the Council, the Carbon Co-op and Todmorden Learning Centre, thank you again to the jury members. Really appreciate it and we hope you stay in touch because it was an honest journey. Thank you.

Councillor Scullion, Leader of Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council:

I wanted you to say and I wanted to pay my respects, really, to all the jury, you know, a rich, rich experience in what you brought here in this council chair.

This is where we work every day. And this was a building heated by heat pumps. Actually, not very much in the building, but... I have a deep, dark secret, as a not-just-that I am Scottish, but my deep, dark secret is I'm passionate about retrofit. I'd say passion about it. There's a lot of heat and light about the local plan and new buildings.

It's a tiny, tiny amount of buildings compared to where we all live currently. Those houses that we live in, some of which will be here in a hundred years or two years' time.

So the challenge for me is not just about new buildings, what that's like, but it's actually about what do we do about places where people try to live. I was interested in lots of things, I was interested in the trust and communications, interested to hear about the different ideas about finance, interested to hear about partnerships in the way that we do this journey together.

I was interested in the use of the word Bible because it could be the Koran or the Torah Or if you're not in a Facebook book of choice in terms of guiding you, how do we live?

How do we live our lives? And that's the real change that you brought to us tonight. How do we live our lives here in Calderdale, full of old, cold, different, different things, really?

And you've really brought our riches to that debate tonight and for that we really, really thank you and I look forward it's going to be challenging and I look forward to the next week of the journey. Thank you so much.