Documents

  • Beat the Cold - about the agency

    • Annual Review 09-10
      A review of the charity’s work in 2009-10 – much easier to read than the Trustees’ Report and Accounts that are sent to the Charity Commission.
    • Annual Review 10-11
      Annual Review for the year 2010-11

  • Local documents

    • Joint Strategic Needs Assessment for Stoke-on-Trent
      Gives extensive data on the health of the City. The pages about fuel poverty contain some grim statistics – see pages 29 to 34 – including the number of households in fuel poverty and the level of excess winter deaths.
    • Making Welfare Work
      Making Welfare Work, written by two leading civil society organisations in Stoke, Brighter Futures and Stoke CAB, shows how severe will be the effect of Welfare benefit changes for people living in the City.
    • SHA – Excess Winter Deaths Report
      Shows why excess winter deaths must be tackled. The background to ‘Pathway to Healthy Homes’.
    • SHA – Pathway to Healthy Homes
      A report by NEA for the West Midlands Strategic Health Authority. Beat the Cold ran two of the four demonstration projects. How can health professionals find the resources to tackle cold-related illness and death? LARGE FILE
    • Stafford Newsleaf November 2011
      Colourful news of sustainability in Stafford Borough. Beat the Cold helped to deliver home energy support in Derrington and Penkside – contributing to their ‘Golden Apples’. Two short case studies of our advice, as well.
    • Stoke-on-Trent Public Health Report 2011
      In part of this report, chapter 3, the Director of Public Health describes ‘vulnerable groups’. What help do they need, who are they, and where are they?
    • Winter leaflets – Young or Old, Beat the Cold
      Both editions of our winter leaflet for 2011-12 with simple advice and contacts for residents of Stoke, Newcastle and the Staffordshire Moorlands.

  • National policy and comment

    • Consumer Focus – list of price comparison sites
      Consumer Focus check the price comparison sites for fairness and accuracy. Use a site that has their ‘Confidence Code’ accreditation.
    • Environmental Audit Committee – Carbon Budgets
      Government plans to review the UK’s carbon budgets in 2014 may undermine certainty over the direction of climate change policy. The EAC has just published its report.
    • Green Deal and Energy Company Obligation Consultation
      A link to the documents and to the online response. Consultation closes on 18 January 2012, so time is tight. Of particular concern to Beat the Cold is that only 25% of ECO funds will help fuel poor households.
    • Health, Mental Health & Housing Conditions in England
      Research for the eaga Charitable Trust by the National Centre for Social Research shows the links between fuel poverty and health, mental health in particular. Fuel poverty is a key public health issue requiring a multifaceted and cross-sector approach.
    • Helping to inform the Green Deal
      The ‘Pay As You Save’ pilot in Sutton has lessons for developing both the Green Deal and support for home improvements in the new world of limited resources.
    • Hills Fuel Poverty Review
      Changing how fuel poverty is defined, superceding the definition of more than 20 years that underlies the government’s Fuel Poverty Strategy. The analysis shows that fuel poverty is a serious, intractable problem. Also a good introduction to the issues.
    • Hills fuel poverty review – analysis of new definition
      Expert comment by Richard Moore on problems associated with the new definition. A report for Consumer Focus
    • Making the connection
      Making the connection: Strengthening the advice, complaint and redress framework. A report produced by the Centre for Consumers and Essential Services, University of Leicester.
    • Many Faces of Fuel Poverty
      Three useful, up to date guides from NEA. Where to find help; examples of how hard it can be to keep warm at home; information for MPs and advice workers. Add Beat the Cold to the useful contacts!
    • Marmot Review: Editorial in the BMJ
      An editorial in the British Medical Journal said: ‘The report highlights an obvious, well known, and largely ignored fact – that cold homes waste energy and harm their occupants.’
    • Marmot Review: Health impacts of cold homes and fuel poverty
      The Marmot Review team produced an incisive report, commissioned by Friends of the Earth, into the clear links between cold homes, fuel poverty and poor health.
    • Solving Fuel Poverty – opportunities from Green Deal and Localisation
      Produced by Localise WM. Fuel poor households will need extra support if they are to benefit from the Green Deal. Involving them, at all, will require trusted visitors to their homes and more than the standardised EPC to calculate savings.
    • Time to reconsider UK energy and fuel poverty policies
      Produced by NEA and commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, this Viewpoint document argues for changes to national policy on climate change so that fuel poor households do not lose out.
    • Understanding the costs and benefits of fuel poverty interventions
      UK Public Health Association. Based on experience of making homes warmer for people in poor health in Manchester. Does this improve health and is it good value for money?
    • uSwitch – households struggle to pay energy bills
      Recent findings show how many households would ration energy use as prices rise. More than half would have to choose between heating and eating. (no info on sample size or method)
    • You just have to get by
      A study for the eaga Charitable Trust. It demonstrates, often in the words of families experiencing cold homes, the difficult choices that fuel poverty forces on some households. The market for fuel does not serve low-income households well.

  • Warm Home Discount