cost of living

UK mortgage lender to offer first 100% loans since 2008 crisis

, ,

I think we should say three cheers to the Skipton Building Society for seeing the potential of this product particularly for those hard working individuals who in life have only themselves to rely on to get a start on the property ladder!

A leading lender plans to launch a 100% mortgage aimed at would-be first-time buyers who cannot save for a deposit, the first since the 2008 financial crisis.

Standard home loans where the borrower does not have to put down a deposit used to be fairly commonplace but the last was axed in the wake of the financial crisis.

However, Skipton Building Society is getting ready to launch a mortgage targeting those “trapped in rental cycles” and who do not have access to “the bank of mum and dad,” and so are therefore unable to save up enough for a home deposit.

Train tickets go up in England and Wales by 5.9%

, , ,

A slight relief for those in rural settings who need to use rail transport on a regular basis, this story tells us:

Regulated rail fares in England and Wales are increasing by up to 5.9% as campaigners call for reforms due to unreliable services.

The increase is above last year’s 4.8% hike but far below the rate of inflation.

The government said that it did not want to add to pressures on households.

However, some groups said that after months of poor services and strikes, passengers are not getting value for money.

About 45% of fares are regulated – they are directly influenced by the government. These include most season tickets, travelcards, and some off-peak returns.

Train operators said fares needed to be set at an appropriate level for the rail industry and its customers.

UK household income likely to fall by £2,000 a year, says thinktank

, , ,

We know the cost of living in rural settings is higher so this is a very interesting challenge to start 2023 with….

British households are only halfway through a two-year cost of living crisis, with average incomes likely to fall by more than £2,000, a leading thinktank has warned.

Typical disposable incomes for working-age family households are on track to fall by 3% in this financial year, and by 4% in the year to April 2024, according to the Resolution Foundation.

Only incomes of the very richest will rise, according to the thinktank’s annual Living Standards Outlook for 2023, while middle-income households will struggle to make ends meet after an average £2,100 loss.

The warning comes amid a rash of strikes by workers demanding pay rises closer to the average inflation rate of 10.7%.

A vote by teachers is expected to back strike action when the ballot results are announced over the next fortnight, adding more than 500,000 public sector workers to a tally that includes nurses, Whitehall civil servants and Border Force staff.

UK inflation rate calculator: How much are prices rising for you?

, ,

You can now work out your personal inflation rate, not sure if that’s a good or a bad thing!!

Every month there’s a new figure for inflation – it estimates how much prices are rising across all the goods and services in the economy.

In the 12 months to November 2022 the figure was 10.7%. That means things costing £1 in November 2021 cost more than £1.10 the same time the following year.

Our personal inflation calculator, built by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in collaboration with the BBC, shows you what the inflation rate is for your household, and identifies the items in your household budget that have gone up the most in price over the past year.

Liz Truss’s claims fracking could produce gas in six months called into doubt as firm warns of 18-month wait

, , ,

It been a while but it looks like our old friend the fracking agenda is making its way back into the rural narrative. This story tells us:

Liz Truss’s claims gas from fracking could flow in six months has been called into doubt – with one company estimating it could take as long as 18 months.

The government lifted the ban on fracking on Thursday, despite warnings from climate campaigners and geologists.

Ms Truss is hoping the move will help make the UK more self-sufficient for energy, but campaigners have warned it would do little to alleviate the huge bills Britons currently face.

And the fracking industry has said the planning and environmental permit process would need to be sped up and earthquake limits relaxed for their investment to make sense.

Firms need both environmental and planning permits to start fracking, as well as licences, Health and Safety Executive scrutiny and consent from the Business Department, according to the UK Onshore Oil and Gas (UKOOG) industry body.

NHS mental health trust sets up food bank for staff

, ,

No don’t do a double take this is true….

A food bank has been set up by an NHS mental health trust over fears its staff are struggling with price rises.

Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) said it was “concerned about the impact of the cost of living crisis”.

It said it had set up a food bank to support those “who may be struggling to afford increasing household costs including food and bills”.

Other trusts in eastern England have also started similar initiatives.

NSFT provides mental health and learning disability care for people in more than 50 locations with main bases at Hellesdon Hospital in Norwich, Wedgwood House in Bury St Edmunds and the Woodlands Unit in Ipswich.

A spokesman said it would “keep talking to our staff about how best we can support them and do everything we are able to to help”.

NHS boss feared waiting for ambulance after stroke

, , ,

This is a chilling story, especially for rural dwellers where according to this if you have stroke symptoms you need someone to get you to A&E fast and not to wait for an ambulance, when the call centre will put you in a second tier of priority.

An NHS boss who had a stroke was taken to A&E by her husband rather than calling for an ambulance because of concerns over long waits.

In a series of tweets, Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust chief executive Deborah Lee praised his swift actions.

She said he had “bundled her into his car”, last week, after she had showed the signs of a stroke because he had heard her “lamenting ambulance delays”.

She is recovering but says it may have been different if they had called 999.

Waits for an ambulance in England are the longest since new targets were introduced, in 2017.

And Ms Lee’s regional service – the South West – has the longest waits in the country, with category-two calls, which include strokes, taking nearly two hours, on average, to reach patients in March.

The target is 18 minutes.

In the tweets, Ms Lee said: “Naturally, I am eternally grateful to my husband for his swift actions… but I can’t get one thing out of my head.

“What if my husband hadn’t been there and my daughter had called for an ambulance and I’d been put in the cat[egory]-two stack?”

She went on to say it was not the fault of the ambulance service and the whole system was “working unrelentingly to solve this but to no great avail”.

Ms Lee said hospitals were struggling to discharge patients, because of a lack of social care, and so delays were building up in the rest of the system.

Cost of living: Rural communities without access to mains gas face ‘a tsunami of poverty’, charity warns

, , , ,

The first of two articles about the impact of rising energy costs on rural areas specifically. Less you thought rural areas were ostensibly affluent!

There’s a warning that “a tsunami of poverty” will hit rural communities if more help isn’t provided to the 14% of British households living without access to mains gas.

Many homes in the countryside which rely on oil, bottled gas, coal and wood to heat and cook are facing rapidly rising bills, made worse due to the volatility caused by the war in Ukraine.

Those alternative fuel sources are not covered by Ofgem’s increased price gap coming into force next month and are often far more expensive than mains supply.

SNP MP Drew Hendry has tabled the Energy Pricing (Off Gas Grid Households) Private Members Bill in parliament to try to provide extra help and protection for households which are off-grid.

He told the Commons last month that those households are forced to pay about four times more for their energy bills than the average home.

The problem mainly affects rural parts of the UK, where mains gas pipes do not reach.

In Cornwall, 47% of homes are off the gas grid.

Heating oil prices more than double in the UK, leaving rural homes with soaring energy bills

, , , ,

..and here is the second argument to ram the point home.

Energy prices are soaring for millions of households across the country as Ofgem’s price cap rises to £1,971 on 1 April.

However, 1.5 million households that are served by heating oil will also find their bills increasing dramatically, according to Energy Helpline.

These homes, which are mostly situated in rural locations, are not covered by the price cap and so they are likely to find themselves affected by rising costs.

Heating oil prices are linked to oil prices more generally, and in recent weeks these have increased rapidly following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and subsequent sanctions – Russia is the third biggest producer of oil in the world.

Rural homes are also facing long delays receiving deliveries of LPG (liquified petroleum gas) as the ongoing HGV driver shortage has left providers struggling to fulfil orders.

Severn Trent Water faces backlash over 7.1% bill rise

, ,

Whilst we were all looking out for energy price increases, it looks like another utility is creeping up in terms of bills and prices, many rural dwellers will be negatively impacted by this proposed rise in prices. This story tells us:

A water company is facing criticism from MPs and members of the public for increasing its average bills by 7.1%.

Severn Trent, which supplies water to eight million people in the Midlands, said it had schemes available to support customers who needed it.

But Conservative and Labour MPs from the region said the rise was one of the biggest in the country.

The government said bill rises were carefully scrutinised by a regulator.

Severn Trent said the rise would mean average household bills would increase by £26 per year.

“That’s a big difference,” Peter Lee, from East Leake, in Nottinghamshire, told the BBC.

“We’ll have to start cutting down on other things. Perhaps we won’t go on holiday in future. We’ve got one booked in August but, after that, I really don’t know.

“What we can do about it… I don’t think the government can do a great deal, other than giving rebates and things like that, but who pays for that – us?”

Load More