A Calderdale councillor wants to see efforts made to better heat tens of thousands of Calderdale’s older homes.

When it meets on Wednesday, the full Calderdale Council is set to debate a motion from Green Party councillor Jamie Furlong urging for a retrofit partnership to be set up to achieve this.

Retrofitting older homes, making them much more energy efficient, is one of the most effective ways of tackling fuel poverty, says Coun Furlong (Green, Todmorden West).

Around 50 per cent of private homes in Calderdale are more than a century old, with thousands of solid stone walled homes which can be cold, draughty, and expensive to heat, councillors heard earlier this year.

A £1.2m trial retrofit scheme, run in conjunction with West Yorkshire Combined Authority, to improve 22 homes at Boothtown, Halifax, established under the previous Labour administration, has been undertaken, including wall and loft insulation and ventilation.

Previously councillors have been told Calderdale faces a challenge of bringing more than 69,000 properties in the borough up to Energy Performance Certificate rating C or above.

This includes fitting insulation, ventilation, and renewable energy technologies such as heat pumps and solar panels to homes, a process called retrofit.

Coun Furlong’s motion calls for the council to develop a comprehensive retrofit strategy and explore establishing a Calderdale retrofit partnership to take the task forward.

This should bring together training providers, local businesses, retrofit specialists, housing providers, health partners and community organisations to support delivery of the strategy, he says.

Work with training providers should look to increase availability of retrofit training, explore funding options for training and explore establishing a retrofit skills hub, says Coun Furlong.

Local supply chains should be developed to ensure skilled local contractors can deliver high-quality retrofit work, he says.

His motion also calls on the council to establish a dedicated retrofit funding officer to identify where grant funding for schemes might come from – Coun Furlong acknowledges significant funding pressures face by councils limit their ability to fund large programmes of this work themselves.

Coun Furlong also wants leader of the Council, Coun Daniel Sutherland (Reform UK, Illingworth and Mixenden) to write to the Government’s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero to seek a further tranche of warm homes local grant funding.

Promoting support and advice on retrofit should also undertaken and the council should explore establishing a Calderdale retrofit one stop shop for this, he urges.

Retrofit support should be prioritised for households which are most at risk of fuel poverty – these would include low income households, vulnerable residents and those living in hard-to-heat homes, he says.