PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Warm Home Discount: Fuel Poverty - 14 October 2025 (Commons/Commons Chamber)

From this winter, an additional 2.7 million households across the UK will receive £150 off their energy bills, which makes a total of nearly 6 million low-income households receiving this vital support. That is the difference that this Government are making to our communities.

I am delighted that thanks to this Government and the warm home discount eligibility extension, thousands more Rochdale families will be eligible for £150 off their bills this winter. It will ensure that young and old alike get more help with their bills this winter. I would like to raise the case of my constituent Keith Gumbridge, who had his cavity wall insulation botched under the previous Government, and who was left with huge legal bills after so-called “no win, no fee” law firm Pure Legal went bust. Mr Gumbridge’s case has been with the Legal Ombudsman for nearly three years; does the Minister agree that that is far too long to wait for justice?

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for all his work championing causes for his constituents. He will know that an extra 280,000 households in the north-west will be eligible for the warm home discount, and that 2.7 million households across the country will be helped this year. I would be more than happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss the case of Mr Gumbridge. Ensuring confidence in the insulation system will be crucial to rolling out the warm homes plan.

I congratulate the Minister on being freed from the Government Whips Office and welcome him to his position on the Front Bench. I commend the Government on extending the warm home discount to a further 2.7 million low-income households, but there is much more to do. With that in mind, will the Minister find time to meet me, so that we can discuss how we can keep people in Newcastle-under-Lyme alive, safe and warm in the colder months ahead?

I thank my hon. Friend for his comments on my liberation from the Government Whips Office. I know that he is a champion for his constituents in Newcastle-under-Lyme, and I am always happy to meet to discuss these important issues. He will know, as I do, that with wholesale gas costs 77% higher than before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we must get people off the rollercoaster of fossil fuel prices and on to clean home-grown power.

The cost of energy has to come down, and one of my jobs as Minister for energy consumers is driving down the cost of bills, but we must also remember that the Government introduced a windfall tax on the oil and gas companies, and we have the price cap on energy, which caps the profits of energy companies. We will continue to take that action.

Despite the oil price being at a six-month low this week, energy prices remain stubbornly high. Given the onset of winter, what further steps will the Minister and his Department take by way of a warm home scheme?

We are taking action through the warm home discount, which is being provided to an extra 2.7 million households across the country, and the warm homes plan, which we will roll out before the end of the year.