October looks to be a bleak month for families - not only is the Universal Credit £20 uplift due to officially end but the energy price maximum cap will be lifted on the first of the month. For parents like me, this is a scary situation to be in.
I live in Market Weighton in Yorkshire, one of the poorest areas in the UK . I’m a single parent to my son, who has autism and an eating disorder called pica, and I work part-time as a freelance journalist earning less than £15,000 a year. We live in social housing and though our rent is lower than most in our county, we’re seeing an increase each year.
When the pandemic hit, I had to drop my hours as I couldn’t juggle childcare and working from home. My son is vulnerable and we’ve had to self-isolate numerous times because he’s been exposed to viruses, sometimes thought to be Covid-19.
Being off work exhausted the savings I managed to accumulate prior to April 2020 and we soon found ourselves resorting to food banks for essentials. We were lucky to receive the Covid-19 and winter grants in 2020, but we have missed many payments for things like council tax over the 18 months and have watched our debt slowly increase.
The journey we’ve been on to find some kind of “new normal” has been difficult. But I fear the road ahead is going to be harder on us.
Losing £86 a month creates a big dent in our income - that’s a council tax bill, a fortnightly food shop, a car insurance payment or petrol, or savings for Christmas. It’s not easy to find that money once it’s been taken away - either you find better-paid work or you have to sacrifice a basic essential.
But the additional sting of energy prices going up means that our outgoings will go up, while our income goes down. We currently pay around £54 a month for our gas and electric bills, but I’m always being told that’s not enough to cover our winter expenses.
While there are only two of us in this house, we use a lot of hot water and lose a lot of heat to ensure good air quality. Winters in the UK, in general, are bitter, but in the north, I’ve always found them harder to deal with financially.
According to Ofgem , people on default tariffs paying by direct debit - often said to be the cheapest way to pay - will see an increase of £139 per year. With the loss of £86 per month, my annual deficit is now £1,171. How on earth can I claw back that money?
If this wasn’t enough, companies like Nestle and Kroger have warned that food prices will continue to soar to the end of the year.My son's eating disorder means he will only eat fresh fruit, so while I'm putting together an emergency tub of food for me in case of lockdown-style shortages, he won't eat any of that. I worry about the cost of meat and fish rising too, and anything that comes from outside of the UK.
Not only will spiralling food prices impact families like ours, but also food banks that rely on the generosity of others.
In the three lockdowns, the food bank was our lifeline. Without it, we wouldn’t have been able to eat. But now I fear, we’re heading back to that situation again - this time our lifeline might be taken away too.
