The minister responsible for housing, Emmanuelle Wargon, had recognized a “hole in the racket”. The government announced, Wednesday, February 16, an emergency aid system for residents of condominiums and tenants of HLM, hitherto excluded from the temporary freeze on gas prices introduced by the executive.
Until then, only individuals could indeed benefit from the regulated tariffs affected by the government’s measures. However, more than 18% of the country’s homes are collectively heated, including part of the HLM stock.
“Some households are currently not protected from the rise in gas market prices, in particular when they are heated using high-power gas boilers and when they have collective supply contracts indexed to the price of gas market »the prime minister’s office admitted in a statement released on Wednesday.
“No steps” to be taken for households
The executive has therefore decided to extend the gas supplier compensation scheme so that “housing heated by gas and not eligible for the regulated sales tariff” may “benefit from compensation aimed at covering the rise in market prices”. The terms of this aid, which will be equivalent to the freezing of regulated gas prices, according to the government, will be detailed “in the next few days”, according to the government statement. “Households will not have to take any steps to benefit from this compensation”assures Matignon, specifying that this compensation will be “automatically passed on to their charges”.
The regulated tariffs, put in place to mitigate the persistent rise in energy prices in Europe, consist of a freeze on gas prices at their October 2021 level until the end of June 2022, and an increase in gas prices. electricity limited to 4%.
The CLCV, a consumer defense association, had called for aid measures for households faced with a surge in collective heating expenses, considering that they were the “forgotten” government measures in the face of the general increase in energy prices. Only people who have a direct contract with an energy supplier benefit from this device. Social landlords are therefore excluded. About 2.5 million tenants live in gas-heated collective housing.