Fraud Squad Urged to Investigate “Catastrophic” £4.6 Billion Net Zero Scheme
MPs have urged Britain’s fraud squad to investigate a “catastrophic” £4.6 billion Government Net Zero scheme after 98% of wall insulation installed under it had major defects that required fixing, some of it posing an urgent health risk. The Telegraph has the story.
In a scathing report published on Friday, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) said the home retrofit scheme that left more than 30,000 properties with defects had “failed at every level”.
It warned over possible fraud in the scheme – which the committee Chairman branded the “most catastrophic fiasco that I have seen” – and urged ministers to refer it to the Serious Fraud Office (SFO).
The committee took aim at Ed Miliband’s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), saying senior officials took two years to recognise the scale of the problem.
More than £4.6 billion is estimated to have been spent under the two household energy-saving schemes: the Energy Company Obligation scheme, which requires suppliers to install insulation in homes with poor energy efficiency, and the Great British Insulation scheme.
The cost is borne by energy suppliers but ultimately passed on to consumers in the form of higher bills.
Despite the huge costs, the schemes have been derailed by poor-quality installation.
The public spending watchdog found last year that nearly all external wall insulation installed up to mid-January 2025 – about 98% – had major defects that required fixing, with some posing immediate health and safety risks.
Between 32,000 and 35,000 homes overall are likely to have been affected during this period, while it is unknown how many more faulty installations have been carried out since.
MPs warned that fraud was likely to have played a major role in the poor quality of insulation installed under the scheme.
Ofgem, the energy regulator, has identified a fraud rate of 1.75% of the work conducted – equivalent to more than £80 million.
However, MPs said this figure was likely to be a “significant underestimate” and called for the SFO to investigate the true scale of fraud across the scheme.
Ministers have said that no household will be liable for paying repair costs as the original installer is required to fix any issues. Costs of up to £20,000 should be covered by a guarantee when the installer has ceased to trade or fails to remediate.
Worth reading in full.
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Does this mean I’ll get fewer cold calls trying to get me to take up government subsidy initiatives?
Ah. Thought not.
Just added cold calls – are you entitled to compensation… we can manage your claim.
And they don’t stop even when registered for no cold calls.
Ah. I was educated about that a few years back. Scammers reverse the Telephone Preference Register to maintain a database of people who are wary of cold calls. They know that numbers in that database either belong to vulnerable (usually elderly) people or to people who are a bit wary but might be reassured by an ‘I’m conducting a survey, I’m not selling anything’ approach. It’s illegal to do this, of course, but so is scamming someone out of a few hundred or thousand pounds. Being on the TPS reveals just one more little bit of information about the number owner.
We try never to answer even the most apparently innocuous question from a cold caller – even if to do so seems rather rude.
As for an approach like ‘I’m the energy adviser for your local area‘…best to shut them up pronto.
Bring it on. Meanwhile a recent report on behalf of the Prosperity Institute points the finger at 15 years of state-sponsored energy fraud of electricity bill payers…
https://www.prosperity.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Its-Broke-Fix-It-Report-RD-22Jan26-FINAL.pdf
“…The influx of 45 GW of renewable capacity resulted in a huge deterioration in the productivity of the grid. Between 2009 and 2024, total generating capacity rose by 20.7% but the enlarged capacity, with nearly 50% renewables, produced 24.2% less electricity. Producing less with more is the fundamental economic fact about renewables.”
The whole idea of “Net Zero” is a massive vehicle for fraud – mainly defrauding the taxpayer.
All sponsored by the green tendency. What could possibly go wrong.
The specialist installers are awarded the right to do subsidised work and professionals who understand the need to allow water vapour to escape and not condense on the cold part of the insulation are not subsidised. Needless to say, the civil servants don’t understand the problem and rely on paperwork and self declaration.
I visited a large house where the owner had recently had the roof renewed and insulated with a multifold quilt on the top just under the tiling. They had used the type which is a vapour barrier instead of the vapour permeable type which allows the water vapour inside the house to escape.
Did you bring them a bottle of mould remover?
Tonka… ‘Elbow Grease’ is the brand name. Require some physical exertion to work.
Cavity walls worked very well for many years and then it was deemed environmentally beneficial to fill them in with gunk. Weird.
ALL of Net Zero is a FRAUD not just this scheme. —-But since all of our institutions are CAPTURED and fully aligned with the phony planet saving agenda it is unlikely that any charges for any Net Zero Scheme will ever come about.