To explain to people that UK homes have never 'not had heating'

[KweenieBeanz]

People keep responding to those worrying about energy costs, don't worry, homes never used to have heating, people survived, just don't put your heating on!
Home did not have central heating. Instead, they had fires and heated individual homes. People did not live in homes with no heating in the UK.

In the UK during the winter if a home is never heated even by late November /December temperatures inside will have gradually dropped to a temperature that's too low.
See the info here: www.cse.org.uk/advice/advice-and-support/heat-and-health#:~:text=Below%2013%C2%B0%20%2D%20If%20your,recommended%20night%20time%20bedroom%20temperature.

There is a huge difference if you even use your heating for just 1hr a day, topping up the temperature to stop it dropping so rapidly.

People need to stop acting as though those struggling just need to toughen up, 'wear more layers' and cope with the heating off this winter as a solution to energy costs, as it's simply not feasible, and it would be better for people to take action now to let their energy provider know they are in fuel poverty and need to access help.

@Lampedsomeoiks but why are we 'terrified'? It costs something like 2p to boil a kettle. Last year it probably cost 1.5p and no-one was panicking, filling flasks, buying (at extra cost) one cup machines or doing without.
We are panicking because we are whipping ourselves up into a frenzy about it, that's why

By buying cheap plug in heaters.

As I explained in my other post they are easily and very cheaply available and can be used instantly.

A person may decide not to buy any and not have any heating that's their choice.

They may live in such extreme poverty that they can't purchase one (although they would probably be entitled to demand their landlord provided means of heating if the house was rented) but someone that poor isn't going to be running central heating either and so their lack of heating is due to poverty not lack of a heating source.

Yeas that what I was thinking! So handy for summer days in the garden!

Yanbu. Not putting the heating on regularly (even for a short time) in winter can result in damp problems and mould growth which can cause health problems and damage to property.
People struggling need to be supported not patronised.

"How does a home without electric heaters (or central heating) have heating?"

Buy buying an electric heater and plugging it in. Most places have electricity.
Also, open fires, but I get that posters have experience of places with no open fires or where they've been boarded up.

We are panicking because we are whipping ourselves up into a frenzy about it, that's why

Not everybody is panicking.

absolustley
i also only boil enough for a cup off coffee
so i have made small steps
i feel guilt when and if i put heating on

but we all need to change our ways and wake up

Someone posted on the FB group recently that their kettle was on 15 or 16 times a day! I suppose that person has more to worry about!

But heating has increased a lot more hasn't it? 3 times as much where I live.

It all adds up and no one is whipping me up. A bloody spreadsheet tells me the numbers. I have cut back my usage to the point of misery. And for what? It still works out more than last year's equivalent.

Don't dismiss peoples' fears.

Our gas bill has just come in at £195 for the last quarter. It has been very mild in the SE. I think the electric bill was about £275 and that's with solar panels. We were pleasantly surprised.

"i also only boil enough for a cup off coffee"

So did you used to boil more than one cup when you only wanted one cup??
(I kind of have to, because my kettle has a safe minimum level).

So they don’t have heating, unless they have the funds to buy specific equipment.

So confirming that it doesn’t actually have heating at all.

i do personally have a lot of hot drinks!

i bet most 20 year old students wouldnt think twice about their magic heating coming on - i know when i stayed in my dd's student house a month ago the heating was on at 3 in the mornign! <<it was lovely>>

That describes my second home as a child. Lived there on and off for 18 years. We had electricity so we also had fires in bedrooms. Just the bathroom was the problem!

"So they don’t have heating, unless they have the funds to buy specific equipment."

Every form of heating requires some kind of equipment!!
You can get a heater pretty cheaply. The problem is paying the bills for electric heating, not buying the heater!!!

"So confirming that it doesn’t actually have heating at all."

It has electricity, you just need to buy the heater! Just like you have to buy food and clothes and everything else. Some people may be extremely poor, but it's not that heating is not possible in their homes.

No heating is free.

Pre-LED light bulbs gave off enough heat to keep people from getting hypothermia. There was some research showing that deaths amongst the elderly increased for this reason once incandescent bulbs were phased out. So it is feasable that people survived living in houses with no heating. It would have been very unpleasant of course.
This actually reinforces your point that telling people not to put the heating has different consequences now compared to the 60s and 70s.

Heaters start at around £20.
As mentioned, the bills are the problem not the cost of the heater, but that would be the same if the LL provided the electric heaters.

Sounds like the sort of house where you’d have had the maid of all work lighting all the fires!

If you are in an electric only property you only have one standing charge. Three months of gas standing charge would easily buy one electric heater.

I grew up in a house with no form of heating. There was a gas fire in living room but it had been condemned. It was horrible and damp but we lived like that for years.

If it also doesn't have an oven, or a hob, or a grill, or a hairdryer, or an iron or a kettle or anything else that generates heat.

As a student with an arse hole landlord who turned off the boiler and locked it up I used all of the above to take the chill off.

If you're going to be pedantic pretty much anything plugged in is generating heat, even the fridge. So houses with electricity have heating.

Now your just being silly, Simon. I, and others didn’t say it was the same. We said it was a heating source if you chose to use it. You remind me of one of my former neighbours who thought she had priority for rehousing because, although we had gas warm air central heating it didn’t stretch to one of the bedrooms and she had an asthmatic son. She’d say, ‘he’s in a bedroom with no heating and he’s asthmatic’ ignoring the fact she could have bought an electric heater and, no, they were not low income! Also ignoring the fact that that particular son didn’t have to sleep in that particular bedroom!