Tens of thousands of households could miss out on thousands of pounds towards replacing their ageing boilers if ministers press ahead with cuts to heat pump grants to fund defence spending.
The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) is expected to slash hundreds of millions from its flagship Boiler Upgrade Scheme (BUS) to help pay for the Defence Investment Plan (DIP) unveiled by Sir Keir Starmer earlier this year.
Under the scheme, eligible households in England and Wales can receive £7,500 towards an air-source or ground-source heat pump, rising to £9,000 for qualifying homes heated by oil or liquefied petroleum gas.
Why up to 20 maternity units in England may close
Smaller maternity units delivering 1,500-2,000 babies a year are becoming less feasible because of a lack of obstetricians and a sharp rise in C-sections.
What you need to know
- Matthew Hopkins, acute care director at NHS Alliance, said the current system is “not fit for purpose”.
- As many as 20 of England’s 155 NHS maternity units could shut, he told .
- Some smaller units struggled to maintain safe staffing numbers.
- Units in rural and coastal areas are most at risk.
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Politicians urged to make change
Hopkins said: “Difficult decisions lie ahead, consolidating maternity services to support safer, more sustainable care.”
“If politicians … are keen to see safe maternity services in their area, it is going to need courage to grasp the nettle that needs to be grasped in order to improve maternity services,” he added.
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The other side of the argument
Hannah Leonard, the chief policy officer of the Royal College of Midwives, disagreed with the call to close smaller units.
“Women and families rely on local maternity units to be there when they need them, and we must ensure there are high-quality services close to home,” she said.
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Why Putin’s shadow fleet now poses greater danger to UK
“Spoofing” strategies are being deployed by Moscow for ships that frequently transit the Channel and Britain’s coast – some of which are known to carry weapons.
How are they doing this?
- New analysis suggests Russia is deepening its manipulation of the automatic identification system (AIS).
- Russia is equipping its vessels with technology which interferes with the AIS system to make it look like the same ship is in two places – often hundreds of miles apart – at the same time.
- New analysis by Ollie Ballinger from UCL showed at least a dozen “shadow fleet” vessels – all but one sailing under a Russian flag – have used a version of the technique in recent weeks.
What other spoofing techniques are being deployed?
The growth in another technique, known as an AIS “handshake”, was revealed by The i Paper last month.
A shadow fleet tanker sails close to another vessel and swaps AIS credentials. The tanker continues its journey while appearing to trackers as the fishing boat.
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What is the risk to the UK?
Any interference with the AIS system represents a significant navigation risk. In a report earlier this year, the Royal Institute of Navigation said such activity presents “a significant cyber security vulnerability and urgent risks to maritime safety”.
There are also fears that shadow tankers are being equipped with weapons or used as launch pads for surveillance drones.
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Australian MP critical after being ‘deliberately’ hit by truck
Independent MP Helen Haines, 65, was hit by an SUV near her office in Wangaratta, Victoria, on Monday at 3.35pm local time.
What you need to know
Haines was hit by a Toyota SUV while was unloading the boot of her car.
She was critically injured and has been airlifted to hospital.
Victoria Police said officers are investigating if the incident was “intentional”. A member of the public detained a 43-year-old man at the scene, it said.
‘A thoroughly decent human being’
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese described Haines as “incredibly hardworking, she is fiercely intelligent, but most importantly she is a thoroughly decent human being – full of integrity and is respected right across parliament”.
Federal opposition leader Angus Taylor said: “This is a shocking day for our nation.”
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However, the clean tech industry is braced for cuts to the scheme under a deal which former energy secretary Ed Miliband agreed with Starmer to reduce DESNZ’s capital budget by £2bn to help fund the DIP, which is facing a £4.7bn shortfall. The cut to the grants scheme was first reported by The Guardian.
Backlash from clean tech industry
An industry source with close links to the Government told The i Paper that they expected a cut “in the order of hundreds of millions” to the BUS’s £2.7bn five-year budget.
A £200m cut would be equivalent to around 22,000–27,000 grants at current rates, while £300m would equate to around 33,000–40,000. These are illustrations of the potential scale, not confirmed numbers of households who would lose support.
Figures from the energy regulator Ofgem show that 96,611 BUS grants had been redeemed by 30 September 2026, with £687.45m paid out since the scheme launched in May 2022.
The scheme has a budget of £400m for 2026–27, with £143,585,000 remaining at the end of September. That figure includes applications being assessed and vouchers issued but not yet redeemed, so it does not represent all the money available to new applicants.
The final impact on households will depend on the eventual size of the cut, whether grant values or eligibility rules change, and how existing applications are treated.
The prospect of a cut to the BUS has already sparked a fierce backlash from the clean tech industry and environmentalists.
The industry source told The i Paper it was “very concerning for the sector” and “a really weird signal to be sending”, given the £2.7bn for the BUS had been confirmed in the Government’s Warm Homes Plan published as recently as January 2026. “That bit of the plan won’t even have survived a year,” they said.
The source pointed out that the UK is already “way off” the target outlined in the Warm Homes Plan to deliver 450,000 heat pump installations in existing and new buildings by 2030.
In 2025, 54,265 heat pumps were retrofitted into domestic properties according to figures from DESNZ, although this does not include installations in new homes.
Cut sends a ‘really bad’ signal
The source said that the cut to the BUS sent a “really bad” signal to the heat pump supply chain. “If companies can’t see that pipeline coming through then they won’t invest,” they said.
The cut would come as targets for heat pump sales are set to be more than doubled. The i Paper reported last week that ministers have proposed raising the target from 8 per cent of relevant boiler sales in 2026-27 to 18 per cent by 2030-31. These plans are subject to consultation and are not yet final, but manufacturers indicated it could force the price of heat pumps down.
Greg Jackson, the founder and chief executive of Octopus Energy, the UK’s largest electricity supplier, said last week that cutting the BUS would be “remarkably short-sighted” and would “put thousands of skilled jobs at risk”.
The Green Party of England and Wales has also criticised cuts to the Warm Homes Plan, particularly in light of the fact that the Government is finally expected to approve the Jackdaw North Sea gas field this week.
Green MP Hannah Spencer said that ministers were “looking to raid the Warm Homes Plan” in next week’s Budget while “issuing oil and gas licences that hand millions in tax breaks to polluters already profiting from high energy costs”.
A DESNZ spokesperson said: “Savings for the Defence Investment Plan are a small part of DESNZ’s overall budget, which saw a significant uplift at spending review.
“We will set out how we will fund essential investment in our national security this autumn.”