Home heating row reaches boiling point
South Hams Council has just refused to pay half the £45,000 cost of installing the environmentally friendly panels in the mix of rented and private houses being built in the town centre.
But now the ultra green group Transition Town Totnes has stepped in, claiming that its members have been left 'shocked' by the council decision.
Campaigners have shown their anger at the council decision with a placard waving protest at one of the sites where South Hams Council and the Newton Abbot-based Midas Homes who are currently in the last stages of building the 53 new homes.
Among them were Totnes Liberal Democrat district councillors Geoff Date and Robert Vint as well as district and county councillor Julian Brazil and Transition Town Totnes boss Rob Hopkins.
A protest letter from Transition Town Totnes, which has been fired off to South Hams Council leader John Tucker, declared: "The councillors who argued that the current level of eco homes are good enough are showing their ignorance of the facts. That standard is only the bare minimum allowed at present."
And it added: "The whole development should have been given renewable energy provision from the start, so reducing the carbon footprint of Totnes, and reducing bills for the occupants. All homes, especially affordable homes, should be affordable to heat."
The major homes development is a partnership scheme involving Midas Homes building the houses and flats on South Hams Council-owned land at The Lamb and Heath Way.
The homes are a mixture of rented social houses and flats, shared ownership homes and homes for sale on the open market.
Most of them were either finished or virtually complete when Midas approached the council, asking it to come up with half the £45,000 to install solar panels in the 10 'for sale' homes in Heath Way, quoting the credit crunch as the reason for the appeal for cash aid.
The council's executive had been urged to say yes but vetoed the proposal after being warned it would not benefit any of the social housing and would be setting a dangerous precedent.
Transition Town Totnes' letter also pointed out: "The Southern Area development was subject to detailed consultation with the community, who stated their strong desire to see sustainable, affordable housing on the site, including renewable energy. Again, in the response to the council's Affordable Housing Policy, the community wanted to see 'affordable warmth' mentioned. The executive's decision goes against these wishes."
And it added: "South Hams Council is showing by this decision that it does not care about raising the standard of building in our area, that it is not concerned with producing homes that are cheaper to run, and that it is content to stay near the bottom of the list of councils for CO2 emissions."
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