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Exactly. I mean Home Energy Scotland programmes, the warmer homes Scotland scheme, area-based schemes and so on.

I deliberately referred to that in my opening remarks because it is an important part of the mix. We are trying to achieve decarbonisation across homes and buildings in a landscape of a devolved/reserved split of powers, expected technological advancement and a differing availability of public money versus the likelihood of private investment—all of it over a long period. That is the challenge, and one main part of it is the cost of electricity. We have been clear for many years about the importance of rebalancing the relationship between the costs of electricity and gas. The Climate Change Committee has been clear that that is one of the most important—if not the most important—UK Government actions that can be taken.

To put a bit of colour around that, we can look at fuel poverty and unit costs. Right now in Scotland, it is estimated that, based on the recent energy price cap announcement, around 33 per cent of all households in Scotland are in fuel poverty and 17 per cent are in extreme fuel poverty. That is before we even get to those who rely on alternative fuels. We can set that against the fact that heat pumps are estimated to be three times as efficient as gas boilers, but the unit costs for electricity are currently around five times higher than for gas. Although about one third of our population are in fuel poverty, the cost of heat pumps is still running about five times higher compared with gas, despite a massive efficiency benefit. I therefore hope that the committee can see how important it is that, as we legislate for our population to make the transition, we have to be able to tell them that it will be affordable and that it will not exacerbate fuel poverty.

Much of what the UK Government is going to do is expected in its warm homes plan, which is now much delayed. I hope that it is delayed because its content is going to be refined and well developed, and that my counterparts are taking their time with it because they are thinking seriously about how to do it as well as possible. Nonetheless, I am in the dark, and I do not know what the UK Government intends to do to rebalance electricity and gas costs. Until I do, I cannot assure Scotland’s population that, in asking them to decarbonise, the schemes will not cost them more to run.

The CCC has been clear that the UK needs to take that action. We cannot bake it into our projections, which is another aspect of our legislation that is difficult to wrestle with. However, as and when the UK Government takes that action, which I hope it does, we will be able to look at our projections and see how they can change.

Fairness has to be at the heart of all of this. I know that we are asking quite a lot of people, but I hope that, by giving a clear explanation of why this is required because of the climate situation and by making it clear that it will benefit people by giving them warmer homes and lower bills, we will be able to make the case. That applies to the private rented sector, too.

When I came back from maternity leave, I felt that a suite of commitments had been made across the board in the heat in buildings space. As I think that I have explained to the committee before, I wanted to take a moment to ensure that they were sequenced properly, with fairness as a key part. The regulatory review group, overseen by Professor Russel Griggs, offered me a bit of insight in that respect.

It is all about sequencing, fairness and practicality. When we ask the private rented sector to abide by a minimum energy efficiency standard, I want to ensure that it will benefit tenants and be workable for landlords. That will require reasonable lead-in times, reasonable support and early engagement.

That is a fair question. The committee will know that the Government has wrestled with that issue and that previous iterations of our proposed bill contained trigger points at which people would be required to switch.

My judgment—it is simply a judgment, informed by advice from my officials—is that that would not be fair. It could catch people at points of difficulty and potentially exacerbate fuel poverty. Therefore, rather than prescribe trigger points, we should set the long-stop date and fill that period with the right support, industry building and regulatory elements, such as the PRS MEES, to encourage behaviour. I have to say again that the greatest encouragement of all will arise when electricity is cheaper.

10:15

I will come to Gareth Fenney, because he is the expert on our schemes.

In essence, our warmer homes Scotland scheme and our area-based schemes are already targeted at those who are at risk of fuel poverty or who are experiencing it. To drive uptake of our schemes, we recently did some marketing that was directed at those who might be in or at risk of fuel poverty.

For my part, I have to speak again to managing to rebalance the costs. A third of the population is in fuel poverty, and unit costs for electricity are five times more expensive.

I am sorry if Gareth Fenney said this while I was flicking through my notes, but so far during the current financial year, the average saving on a fuel bill because of warmer homes Scotland has been £350 per year.

Henry Hardy will respond to the question on updating the climate change plan.

Consumer engagement is absolutely critical. I come back to the point about the level of need in the country and the fact that 33 per cent of people are in fuel poverty. I am conscious that, when people are trying to heat their homes or make ends meet, they do not have the capacity to navigate something that is complicated and feels risky and which they do not trust.

I think that I mentioned to Willie Coffey that we are trying to respond to the consumer research that we have done on the issue, to make Home Energy Scotland the trusted number 1 door through which you walk if you want to engage in the question of energy efficiency and clean heat, and to make the process as easy as possible.

I also come back to the marketing and investment that we have done, which is about communicating in a really public-friendly way about the opportunities that are ahead. I think that we started that work towards the end of last year.

The greatest driver of the public’s confidence will come when we can all say, “This will make your home warmer and bring your bills down.” Until we have the warm homes plan and the certainty on what Mr Griffin’s colleagues will do, we cannot quite say that, but I have confidence that we will get there.

I will come to Henry Hardy to say something about the plan update.

We definitely want to improve that pipeline, and I have said several times that I want Home Energy Scotland to be the repository for that advice. You are right that it will be required more as we scale up; equally, there is nothing more effective than seeing your neighbours go through the process. There is a floodgates argument that, when more homes in a street have had the work done and more neighbours are talking to each other about their personal experience, that is more of a positive encouragement than anything that politicians can do. Of course we will all support constituents in our own areas.

The budget announcement is happening later today. I will resist pre-empting the content of that in relation to support for the likes of Home Energy Scotland.

Absolutely—that is a fair point. As a minister, I receive correspondence about issues across my portfolio and a substantial part of it is from MSPs who come to me on behalf of their constituents who have had experiences such as those that you mentioned or who have had some difficulty.

From my perspective, albeit this is only anecdotal, the correspondence that I receive from MSPs now leans more towards complex cases where there has been difficulty, as opposed to run-of-the-mill cases where there has been difficulty. That is positive, but I have no doubt that there is still work to do.

Gareth Fenney knows a great deal more about the operational aspects of the scheme. Do you want to give any views on that, Gareth?

10:30

Among a couple of key issues, costs are paramount in all those considerations, whether for the individual, the public purse or industry—it will be a combination of those that will meet the costs of all this.

It is important to say when we are discussing costs that we are talking about a 15-year trajectory, which makes it inherently difficult to be as accurate as we might like to be. That is not only because technological advances will undoubtedly happen in that period—who knows what technology will emerge, and the cost of certain products will come down as they become more readily manufacturable—but because changes in UK Government policy will affect the cost of running clean heating systems. I put that on the record so that the committee can understand the uncertainties that we are dealing with.

Henry Hardy is the expert on the climate legislation, which is not so much my bag any more. Despite that uncertainty, we set out more detail on costs than other Administrations throughout the UK, because our legislation requires us to do that. We already have more detail than others might provide, despite the uncertain horizon. For the buildings piece, we have included as much detail as we can, as accurately as we can.