Honest RHI users have been unfairly penalised to cover political failure over the scheme

The Renewable Heat Incentive scheme was a dramatic example of poor Stormont governance.

The publication of the inquiry findings into the Cash for Ash saga last year might have seemed like the end of the saga. But it wasn’t.

In the clamour to appease justified public anger over the incompetence of devolved ministers, advisors and officials, the tariffs for the heating scheme have been slashed.

It is an easy political move to make. After all, who is going to sympathise with anyone who runs RHI boilers, given that the slack payment scheme was ruthlessly exploited by some users, who ran heat almost non-stop to maximise income?

Such abuses were all the more offensive given that it was a supposed ecologically friendly scheme that was in fact grossly damaging to the environment in terms of energy wastage.

The problem with slashing tariffs however is that many businesses adopted RHI in good faith, intending to lessen their reliance on fossil fuels and their carbon imprint.

They were given financial guarantees to make the change. Arlene Foster as enterprise minister wrote to Ulster Bank in 2013 urging them to “look favourably” on applicants because “government support, on offer through incentive schemes, is reliable, long term and ... a good return on investment”.

On page 18 (of the print edition, to be put online later), Tom Forgrave, a poultry farmer, writes about how some such business now face “ruinous” subsidy cuts. In 2017 and 2019 cuts to the tariffs paid to boiler owners to £13,000 then £2,000 per year had already contained the disastrous overall cost of RHI. Now it will be closed with a lump sum paid that is less than some owners once got annually.

This newspaper helped lead the coverage of the RHI scandal. We called for an inquiry into it, such was the appalling drain on finances, robbing other public services of funds.

It was important that nothing like it happened again. Yet few officials or politicians implicated in RHI gross incompetence saw their careers suffer. In an ideal world it would be these culprits who would pay some price, not RHI users who were encouraged to join the scheme and did so responsibly.

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