To think it’s not going to be a case of heating or eating for many families

[LadyCatStark]

We can forget heating altogether! I know it’s a nice little rhyme but for many, many families it’s going to be a case of eating or putting just enough petrol in the car to get you to work to pay all these increased costs. Eating yourself, or feeding your kids (hopefully most people will choose their kids). Eating healthily or eating cheap rubbish.

I’ve just nipped to Aldi as I had a work appointment cancel in the area and spent £40 just on the few bits I needed, not even a proper shop. I could have cried that I’d driven even just the 15 minutes to my appointment and it was cancelled and every drop of fuel counts.

[quote GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER]**@BambinaJAS, if you mean that the U.K. is now importing fresh food from countries outside the EU, that has long been the case for some things, e.g. out of season asparagus, mange-tout and pineapples, but I still see the same amount of salad stuff from the Netherlands and Spain, tons of Danish butter and bacon, pork from the NL and Germany, French cheese, butter and yoghurt, and so on, in my local supermarkets.

So I’m not sure where you got that idea from, unless you live elsewhere than the U.K. and are making erroneous, Brexit-related assumptions.[/quote]
You are wrong.

No point in discussing things further with blinkered brexiters.

Have fun eating those turnips.

If it's any consolation diesel prices are over around 2€ /litre this week in france. There is talk of it hitting nearly 3€ this coming week. DH spent €126 filling up this week.

I do a lot of my food shopping in Lidl. This week I have British apples, British kale, British asparagus, british Maris piper potatoes and British carrots. All on offer and no sign of a turnip.

@Letsgobacktothenineties

Portugal here…massive rises in petrol, food and we’re waiting on the electricity bill. Food shortages now too, it’s frightening.

Same here in Scandinavia. It’s worrying.

@Yorkshirelass04

There does seem to be some evidence UK is uniquely explained to fuel cost issues, and this article also reminded me that we were promised lower fuel costs post Brexit. www.newstatesman.com/energy-climate-tech/2021/09/gas-price-crisis-is-brexit-russia-or-covid-19-to-blame

If there is a 'perfect storm' of events (as a pp suggests), why are you so keen to pin the blame solely on Brexit?

The health of the nation generally
Yes its going to affect the poor far more, I put that in my PP.
I think food banks will end up as community kitchens as it will be impossible to cook for many people due to costs.

It is going to affect the poor far more bitemyarsenic yes, I know we were agreed on that. What I'm pointing out is that when people have less money to spend on food, in a society where the cheapest food is so often obesogenic and lacking in nutrients, there's a good chance they're going to get less healthy not more. It's going to be bad for the health of the nation, not good. We'd have to be doing a helluva lot more walking to counter those effects.

@HardyBuckette

The health of the nation generally Yes its going to affect the poor far more, I put that in my PP. I think food banks will end up as community kitchens as it will be impossible to cook for many people due to costs.

It is going to affect the poor far more bitemyarsenic yes, I know we were agreed on that. What I'm pointing out is that when people have less money to spend on food, in a society where the cheapest food is so often obesogenic and lacking in nutrients, there's a good chance they're going to get less healthy not more. It's going to be bad for the health of the nation, not good. We'd have to be doing a helluva lot more walking to counter those effects.

Yes I know.

Im talking about over consumption.
Booze, Gin clubs, prosecco,huge portions, takeaways, expensive junk delivered to your door , the poor arent buying these things now let alone when prices increase.

Yes I know.

Im talking about over consumption.
Booze, Gin clubs, prosecco,huge portions, takeaways, expensive junk delivered to your door , the poor arent buying these things now let alone when prices increase.

Well they sometimes are. You might have heard about the impact of cheapo fried chicken shops, for example? In poorer areas, you don't typically need to go far to inexpensive takeaways. I must have a dozen within a few minutes walk, doing good business too.

And for people who are buying expensive versions of the things you mention, if they're priced out of one you seem to be assuming they're just going to stop, as opposed to going cheaper. If the gin club is too expensive there's Gordons or own brand in the supermarket. If you're getting expensive junk delivered to your door, cheaper junk being delivered to your door is also an option for you. It simply isn't the case that things becoming more expensive means people become healthier.

I just picked up a couple of magazines with my shopping. I put one back because it’s not my lifestyle unfortunately. The assistant scanned the other one and couldn’t find the price, it was £4.35 so I put that back as well.
I used to spend on books and magazines I now read a lot on Kindle Unlimited. I like to support bookshops but can only do so occasionally.

All of this stuff was happening before Ukraine. This is all tory policies, brevity, covid and the world economic picture changing. Nothing to do with Ukraine and don't fall for the bullshit from the tories that it is to do with the war either. They want to distract that it is a problem partly of their making.

@HardyBuckette

Yes I know.

Im talking about over consumption.
Booze, Gin clubs, prosecco,huge portions, takeaways, expensive junk delivered to your door , the poor arent buying these things now let alone when prices increase.

Well they sometimes are. You might have heard about the impact of cheapo fried chicken shops, for example? In poorer areas, you don't typically need to go far to inexpensive takeaways. I must have a dozen within a few minutes walk, doing good business too.

And for people who are buying expensive versions of the things you mention, if they're priced out of one you seem to be assuming they're just going to stop, as opposed to going cheaper. If the gin club is too expensive there's Gordons or own brand in the supermarket. If you're getting expensive junk delivered to your door, cheaper junk being delivered to your door is also an option for you. It simply isn't the case that things becoming more expensive means people become healthier.

Im not talking about people who use chicken shops though. Straw man etc

Brexiters seem unable to understand what barriers to trade mean.

If the price of food and gas goes up then the price for consumers goes up at the global level.

But what is unique to the UK:

That anything EU based (that already has the price increases) which goes to the UK now has to be checked. This means additional costs (referred to as non-tariff barriers).

Those additional costs at the border are amplifying the price increases in the UK for
food products.

Those additional costs would not exist if the UK was still in the Single Market/Customs Union.

The price of fuel going up will impact so many other things (not just food) in the fact that transporting the item itself or the raw materials or both will have got more expensive.
I work in the jewellery trade and metal prices have risen dramatically in the last few weeks, and diamond prices have risen as well. It's almost impossible to estimate the cost or quote for anything.
Obviously jewellery is a complete non essential and something people can easily cut out or cut back on, but gold, platinum, palladium and rhodium are all used in other industries as well.

@HardyBuckette

Yes I know.

Im talking about over consumption.
Booze, Gin clubs, prosecco,huge portions, takeaways, expensive junk delivered to your door , the poor arent buying these things now let alone when prices increase.

Well they sometimes are. You might have heard about the impact of cheapo fried chicken shops, for example? In poorer areas, you don't typically need to go far to inexpensive takeaways. I must have a dozen within a few minutes walk, doing good business too.

And for people who are buying expensive versions of the things you mention, if they're priced out of one you seem to be assuming they're just going to stop, as opposed to going cheaper. If the gin club is too expensive there's Gordons or own brand in the supermarket. If you're getting expensive junk delivered to your door, cheaper junk being delivered to your door is also an option for you. It simply isn't the case that things becoming more expensive means people become healthier.

Yes. Within a 10 minute walk of my flat there's 2 McDonald's, 2 Greggs, a KFC, another fried chicken shop, a kebab shop, 3(?) chippie type takeaways, a Chinese takeaway, two Indian takeaways, an assortment of Off Licences and an Asda superstore. Off the top of my head.

While it isn't the cheapest way of feeding yourself, these places are by no means expensive and I'd be willing to bet quite a lot that their main clientele aren't massively well off people walking over from a nicer parts of town.

@Malibuismysecrethome do you have a library card? I got a press reader account with my library card and get loads of magazines for free online.

This is not down to Ukraine. Martin Lewis pointed out this week that all the fuel and energy rises were prior to this. Tory rhetoric would love you to blame the war but it really isn't the cause. It hasn't helped, but they are using it as a scapegoat.

While it isn't the cheapest way of feeding yourself, these places are by no means expensive and I'd be willing to bet quite a lot that their main clientele aren't massively well off people walking over from a nicer parts of town.

Yes and not the group Im talking about for the 100th time

Im not talking about people who use chicken shops though.
Straw man etc

Yes you are. You referred to people who get takeaways. That of course includes fried chicken shops, so you are talking about them. What I think you mean here is that you reckon the poor aren't using them. Which isn't true.

Specifically addressing the people with more expensive habits which you seem to want to focus on, the issue is that even though you get to a point where some people are priced out of alcohol and eating more calories than they use/sufficient calories, there's a lot to drop before then and if people are priced out of one unhealthy luxury, they may very well simply move to a cheaper but no less unhealthy version instead.

@Gynaesaur that's impressive! We have both a pound bakery and a Greggs within about 30 yards of each other, which I feel should grant us some bragging rights too!

Yes you are. You referred to people who get takeaways. That of course includes fried chicken shops, so you are talking about them. What I think you mean here is that you reckon the poor aren't using them. Which isn't true.

Nope notctalking about the poor here.
Im talking about over consumption of expensive foods/ drinks that people will cut down on.
Which your second paragraph actually addresses.hurrah!
Do you think people will just go for cheap versions?
I think they will just cancel the subscription and go without as it no longer has the status they want.
Imo 🤷‍♂️

Sorry should have said cut down the expensive takeaway to special occasions rather than every week.

@bitemyarsenic

Yes you are. You referred to people who get takeaways. That of course includes fried chicken shops, so you are talking about them. What I think you mean here is that you reckon the poor aren't using them. Which isn't true.

Nope notctalking about the poor here.
Im talking about over consumption of expensive foods/ drinks that people will cut down on.
Which your second paragraph actually addresses.hurrah!
Do you think people will just go for cheap versions?
I think they will just cancel the subscription and go without as it no longer has the status they want.
Imo 🤷‍♂️

The thing is that the poor are a vast part of this picture. And so even if what you think will happen with higher income people did happen, you'd still have to consider the impact of people being driven to cheap, obesogenic, low nutrient foods when you talk about the national picture.

Re status- I wouldn't have said most of those things were particularly high status tbh? Maybe gin clubs. Prosecco if anything seems to be seen as quite lower class. Takeaways are at minimum not a middle class/posh thing.

I think hospitality will suffer first, takeaways, bars and restaurants wont be so attractive when it's that or heating.

@sqirrelfriends

I think hospitality will suffer first, takeaways, bars and restaurants wont be so attractive when it's that or heating.

It depends if prices can fall to keep demand up. I've actually noticed this when I've come to book a table for a restaurant we love, they are now doing a set menu for a lower price during the day. This is something they never did as they always had a waiting list for tables

I rarely buy take always anyway. We could afford to but chose not to

No one can be bothered to go and get them or ring up

@sqirrelfriends restaurants still busy when I went this weekend however maybe will change in next few months. Personally for me occasional meals out is something I would still likely do but I don't have children.