A quarter of Britain’s small and local builders want the government’s Green Deal initiative to work, but many have said the red-tape and negative publicity surrounding the scheme must be addressed or else it could be doomed to fail.

Research carried out by the Federation of Master Builders (FMB) found that 27 per cent of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in construction are planning to get involved in the Green Deal, which will allow for people and businesses to make green improvements to their premises without having to stump up the cost up front.

The FMB’s chief executive, Brian Berry, said that many trusted local traders are very keen on the scheme but have said that it is not easy for them to get involved.

“People want to use their local builder to have energy-efficient improvement work carried out, because they know them and have used them before,” he explained. “But the scheme has been designed so large numbers of small firms are excluded because of the significant costs involved in offering Green Deal finance directly to homeowners. Instead local firms will have to find a large finance provider to work with.”

He called on the government to work on the support, training and publicity surrounding the scheme, in order to help smaller builders obtain the funding to be able to take part.