THE cost-of-living crisis is still hammering households in every corner of the country, the TUC warned today, as inflation figures remained unchanged and Britain is believed to have slipped into recession.
The union body called for ministers to extend cost-of-living payments which are set to end by March after figures by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed that Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation remained at 4 per cent in January.
Food prices fell for the first time by 0.4 per cent since September 2021, with the cost of bread and cereals, cream crackers and chocolate biscuits falling, the ONS said.
The costs are still 7 per cent higher than a year ago.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak insisted that the economy has “turned the corner” following the data.
But the ONS is due to publish gross domestic product (GDP) figures for December on Thursday and is predicted by experts to reveal that Britain’s economy contracted for the second quarter in a row in the final three months of 2023.
UNIONS called for an end to “rampant profiteering” as official figures showed food inflation remains at a painfully high 9.2 per cent in the run-up to Christmas.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said yesterday’s larger-than-expected drop in overall inflation would not offset the real-terms fall in wages this Christmas.
She said: “Headline inflation might be slowing, but workers know their wages aren’t going as far as they did two years ago.
“Even the competition regulator now admits what Unite has said all along: that firms have been exploiting the cost-of-living crisis to raise prices excessively.
“It’s time the government and Bank of England tackled the rampant profiteering in our economy to get inflation under control.”
Responding to the figures showing CPI inflation slowing to 3.9 per cent and RPI inflation to 5.3 per cent, TUC general secretary Paul Nowak added: “Today’s inflation figures will provide scant relief for hard-pressed families. Prices are still going up — just a bit more slowly.
“Household budgets remain under immense pressure. And many families will struggle with the cost of Christmas, with food and energy bills sky high.”
Average income for UK workers will be worse in 2024 than 2019, think tank predicts
This parliament is the worst on record for income growth, a think tank has concluded after research into UK living standards revealed the average income for a UK worker is projected to be 4% lower in 2024 than in 2019.
A report published today by Resolution Foundation laid out the likely backdrop of living standards for a 2024 election, and, unsurprisingly, it does not look good for the Tory Government.
Although Rishi Sunak may meet his target of halving inflation by the end of 2023, the report lays out little sign of relief from cost of living pressures into the future, predicting three-years of income stagnation for UK workers, into 2025-26.
With a looming general election, this does not bode well for the Tories, with no example of a government ever managing to retain power with such a weak median income growth since comparable records began in the 1960s.
RISHI SUNAK’S five key promises, made shortly after becoming Prime Minister in January, have turned into five failures according to figures showing ministers’ lack of progress since then.
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Taking his pledges in turn, inflation remains the highest in the G7 –with RPI still at an eye-watering 10.7 per cent in June.
NHS waiting lists in England this week hit a new record high of 7.6 million.
And Britain’s debt pile was bigger than its economic output in June – the first time this has happened in more than 60 years.
Today’s 0.2 per cent growth in Q2 GDP was hailed as an unexpected win for Britain’s spluttering economy, which the Bank of England says will remain sluggish for years to come.
And dangerous refugee crossings not only set a new record for the month of June, but fresh arrivals on Thursday saw the total number of people risking their lives to cross the English Channel on small boats reach 100,000 for the first time since 2018.
Madrid (AFP) – Climate activists said Sunday they had plugged the holes on 10 golf courses across Spain to protest at the sport’s excessive water usage as Europe lives through a severe drought.
Activists from Extinction Rebellion (XR) filled in the holes under cover of darkness in Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, the Basque Country, Navarra and the Balearic Island of Ibiza to denounce “the waste of water during one of the worst droughts Europe has ever suffered”.
“Golf has no place in a world without water,” said a statement from the group, which uses direct action to underline its warnings about the dangers to the planet.
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“Just one hole of a golf course consumes more than 100,000 litres of water a day to maintain the surrounding green,” XR said, citing figures from the Spanish NGO Ecologists In Action.
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Experts say parts of Spain — which is the world’s biggest exporter of olive oil and a key source of Europe’s fruit and vegetables — are the driest they’ve been in a thousand years, with the prolonged drought depleting reservoirs to half their normal capacity.
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Extinction Rebellion said it was part of a series of international protests “targeting the richest 1 percent of the population” through their golf courses, private jets and high-end cars to make clear that “the rich and their leisure activities that waste essential resources are a luxury we cannot afford”.
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It should be clear – if you bother to engage your brain – that the climate crisis is already affecting inflation and the cost of living crisis. Less precipitation (rain) and disrupted weather [patterns] through climate change mean less crops and increased prices in the supermarket for your fruit and veg, vegetable and olive oil, all those goods made from wheat, corn, beans, etc. The Capitalists will tell you it’s all because of the war in Ukraine. Bollocks, climate change is adversely affecting crops everywhere, Ukraine is not the only place growing crops. Climate change is affecting everyone now.
It’s also noted that the rich are specifically addressed targeted.
Related: Climate change crisis: Golf courses on borrowed time as Earth’s weather patterns become wilder
