Lancashire residents who rely on heating oil will be able to access support to help with rising bills as a result of the conflict in Iran.
The cash is Lancashire County Council’s allocation from a £50m nationwide fund – announced last week – for low-income households that are not connected to the national grid for gas.
Around 13,000 homes in the county use heating oil, according to figures from the UK and Ireland Fuel Distributors Association and the Oil Firing Technical Association.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service understands that County Hall will issue the funding to Lancashire’s 12 district councils – Burnley, Chorley, Fylde, Hyndburn, Lancaster, Pendle, Preston, Ribble Valley, Rossendale, South Ribble, Wyre and West Lancashire – which will then invite applications from affected householders within their area.
The total £454,000 pot will be distributed according to the number of oil-fuelled properties in each borough. Homes in remote rural areas are most likely to be without a grid connection.
As standalone authorities, Blackpool and Blackburn with Darwen will receive funding allocations for their patches directly from the government.
The price of kerosene – the fuel used for heating oil – has rocketed since the United States and Israel went to war with Iran almost a month ago.
Unlike gas and electricity customers, those who heat their homes with oil are not covered by the energy price cap - meaning they are exposed to more immediate energy price hikes.
The heating oil support is being delivered via the government’s new Crisis and Resilience Fund (CRF), from which Lancashire County Council will receive £17.2m over the next 12 months to provide more general hardship help to households – including those with other alternative energy needs.
A spokesperson for Lancashire County Council said: “The CRF can be used to support households reliant on alternative fuel sources other than heating oil, such as LPG – and crisis payments from it can be used to support energy costs for any form of fuel used for domestic heating, cooking or lighting, including oil or portable gas cylinders.”
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