cost of living crisis

No new North Sea drilling in 2025, new analysis finds

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/no-new-north-sea-drilling-2025-new-analysis-finds

 Campaigners from Oceana UK protest outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, where the environmental group is taking the government to court over 31 licences for oil and gas exploration, March 26, 2025

NOT a single exploration well was drilled in North Sea waters in 2025 – the first year since oil and gas was discovered there in the 1960s, analysis finds.

Energy consultants Wood Mackenzie found oil and gas investment on the UK continental shelf, which stood at £4 billion this year, is set to plunge by more than 40 per cent in the next to £2.5bn, its lowest level for more than 50 years.

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Greenpeace UK’s Paul Morozzo said: “This isn’t a temporary blip.

“The North Sea’s days as an oil and gas basin are coming to an end. Investment is falling because of physical constraints and decreased profitability.

“The real risk now is chasing a declining industry instead of preparing for what comes next. 

“Doubling down on oil and gas won’t protect jobs, energy security or household bills.

“It’s time the government took action on the cost of living crisis, as well as to protect us all against the worst impacts of climate change. 

“The way to do that is by investing in the industries of the future, not clinging to one that’s in terminal decline.”

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/no-new-north-sea-drilling-2025-new-analysis-finds

Experienced climbers scale a rock face near the historic Dumbarton castle in Glasgow, releasing a banner that reads “Climate on a Cliff Edge.” One activist, dressed as a globe, symbolically looms near the edge, while another plays the bagpipes on the shores below. | Photo courtesy of Extinction Rebellion and Mark Richards
Experienced climbers scale a rock face near the historic Dumbarton castle in Glasgow, releasing a banner that reads “Climate on a Cliff Edge.” One activist, dressed as a globe, symbolically looms near the edge, while another plays the bagpipes on the shores below. | Photo courtesy of Extinction Rebellion and Mark Richards
Image of InBedWithBigOil by Not Here To Be Liked + Hex Prints from Just Stop Oil's You May Find Yourself... art auction. Featuring Rishi Sunak, Fossil Fuels and Rupert Murdoch.
Image of InBedWithBigOil by Not Here To Be Liked + Hex Prints from Just Stop Oil’s You May Find Yourself… art auction. Featuring Rishi Sunak, Fossil Fuels and Rupert Murdoch.
Continue ReadingNo new North Sea drilling in 2025, new analysis finds

Reacting to large price hikes that kick in today at the start of what has been dubbed ‘awful April’, co-leader of the Green party, Carla Denyer, said: 

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Image of the Green Party's Carla Denyer on BBC Question Time.
Image of the Green Party’s Carla Denyer on BBC Question Time.

“Energy bills up to nearly £2000 a year. Water bills up by 31% in some areas. Basic food prices keep rising – the list goes on. People aren’t fooling around when they say today is the start of “Awful April”. Especially awful for single parents who we know will be hit hardest by these price hikes. 

“These spiralling costs come on the back of axing winter fuel payments for pensioners, refusing to remove the two-child benefit cap and cutting benefits for the sick and disabled. 

“These are political choices. Rather than making the poorest and most vulnerable in society bear the brunt of the cost of living crisis, Labour could have chosen instead to tax a tiny percentage of the wealth of multi-millionaires and billionaires. They’ve made a choice, to take money off the old, ill and disabled. 

“Labour have again and again made the wrong choices, which has left many of the poorest households at breaking point.”

Keir Starmer says that his Labour Party is intensely relaxed about assaulting the very poorest and most vulnerable.
Keir Starmer says that his Labour Party is intensely relaxed about assaulting the very poorest and most vulnerable.
Continue ReadingReacting to large price hikes that kick in today at the start of what has been dubbed ‘awful April’, co-leader of the Green party, Carla Denyer, said: 

Barrage of bill hikes sees the cost-of-living crisis bite

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/barrage-of-bill-hikes-sees-the-cost-of-living-crisis-bite

Protesters on Whitehall in London, as Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves delivers her spring statement to MPs in the House of Commons, March 26, 2025

Government must take action, union warns: ‘We can’t go on with billionaires getting ever richer whilst working people suffer’

CASH-STRAPPED Britons will be squeezed for an extra £66 every month from April as a barrage of bill hikes sees the cost-of-living crisis bite.

Millions of hard-up households, already paying what MPs said were “world-beatingly” high bills, will be forced to shell out even more for essentials from Tuesday.

GMB union urged ministers to take bold steps to help working people facing across-the-board price rises for energy, water, council tax, internet, road tax and the TV licence.

“Households have been struggling with the cost-of-living crisis for several years now,” said the union’s national secretary Andy Prendergast. “This latest set of increases shows there still isn’t any light at the end of the tunnel.

“The government must take bold steps to put money in people’s pockets,” he thundered. “We can’t go on with billionaires getting ever richer whilst working people suffer.”

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Cat Hobbs, founder and director of public service campaign group We Own It, said: “With bill hikes across many essential services this spring, it looks like the cost-of-living crisis is sadly here to stay.

“The word ‘essential’ is important here. Heat, shelter, water — these are all things that we need to survive and none of them are getting cheaper.

“Water is the poster-child for the failed privatisation experiment, with companies on the brink of collapse scrambling for more of our money.

“Companies that have racked up huge debts to pay dividends are now running out of other people’s cash.

“Decades of underinvestment has killed our rivers and put the whole water network at risk.

“Modern, publicly owned services must be the goal for any progressive government.”

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/barrage-of-bill-hikes-sees-the-cost-of-living-crisis-bite

Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.
Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.
Continue ReadingBarrage of bill hikes sees the cost-of-living crisis bite

Nearly 20% of Brits already living in poverty before cost-of-living crisis, report finds

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/nearly-20-of-brits-already-living-in-poverty-before-cost-of-living-crisis

Image of banknotes and prepayment meter key

MILLIONS of people in Britain, including 3.9 million children and 1.7m pensioners, were in living in poverty even before the cost-of-living crisis hit, damning figures revealed today.

Around 20 per cent of the population, equating to 13.4m people, were living in poverty in 2020/21, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s annual poverty report found.

The report warned that there are elements in the benefits system that increase poverty, including the two-child limit, five-week wait for universal credit payments and unaffordable debt deductions.

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About 7.2m people are skipping meals, showers and heating, it found.

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/nearly-20-of-brits-already-living-in-poverty-before-cost-of-living-crisis

Continue ReadingNearly 20% of Brits already living in poverty before cost-of-living crisis, report finds

30 million in UK ‘priced out of decent standard of living by 2024’

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Image of cash and pre-payment meter key
Image of cash and pre-payment meter key

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/dec/12/30-million-in-uk-priced-out-of-decent-standard-of-living-by-2024

Thirty million people in the UK will be unable to afford what the public considers to be a decent standard of living by the time the current parliament ends in 2024, according to a study.

The New Economics Foundation, a left-leaning thinktank, said rising prices, below-inflation increases in earnings and projected increases in unemployment would result in 43% of households lacking the resources to put food on the table, buy new clothes or treat themselves and their families – a 12 percentage point rise compared with 2019.

The NEF said its calculation that by 2024 almost 90% of single parents and 50% of workers with children would fall below a minimum income standard showed the need for a radical overhaul of the welfare system.

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Continue Reading30 million in UK ‘priced out of decent standard of living by 2024’