A Cornish woman speaks out: “Second homes are bad. We know this. It’s why there’s such a thing as the Cornwall Community Foundation, a charity set up by second home owners to make them feel better about destroying communities, perpetuating gross economic inequality and contributing to the housing crisis. But there’s something missing from this guilt list, something rarely mentioned in the context of housing: climate change.”

Catrina Davies  www.thetimes.co.uk

Second home ownership has risen by almost a third in 20 years. In 2018 two thirds of all the houses sold around Padstow (David Cameron’s occasional abode) were bought for second homes. The Resolution Foundation has estimated that one in ten Britons owns a second home while four in ten own no property at all. In some parts of Pembrokeshire 70 per cent of the houses are second homes. No coincidence, perhaps, that Cornwall and west Wales are the two most economically deprived regions in northern Europe.

So far, so depressing, but what’s it got to do with climate change? First, wasted energy. I grew up in west Cornwall, working as an author, musician and occasional gardener and cleaner but I can only afford to stay there as an adult by living in a shed with no insulation and no central heating. I found it deeply dispiriting therefore when I went to clean someone’s second home on a Saturday morning in December to find the five-bed house, which has been empty for four months, 15C warmer than my own place.

I found that the oil-fired boiler was linked to a thermostat which was set to 19C. Walking home I noticed the vents belonging to all the empty houses on the cliff chuffing out steam like Thomas the Tank Engine. I assume it’s because granite cottages smell damp if they’re not lived in.

I don’t have a fridge, partly because they cost a lot in electricity and partly because HFCs, the chemicals used in fridges and air conditioning, are up to 9,000 times more warming for the atmosphere than CO2. Yet all the empty houses have family-sized fridge freezers and I’ve only ever had one client turn theirs off when the house is empty. Most second homes have lights that come on automatically every night and winking burglar alarms.

Incredibly, 6,650 of Cornwall’s 8,808 registered holiday lets pay zero towards local services. The most recent study in July 2018 estimates that Cornwall council loses £13 million in tax revenue because of second homes. Set this against the council’s projected budget deficit of £17.3 million by 2023-24. Factor in a promise to spend £16 million tackling climate change, and weep.

Catrina Davies is the author of Homesick: Why I Live in a Shed, published by Riverrun