The UK has borrowed too much money, has a massive debt - £105 billion goes on paying our debt interest

[cakeorwine]

A good visual guide from the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/ng-interactive/2025/mar/24/visual-analysis-how-the-markets-boxed-in-rachel-reeves

But basically, the UK has had to rely on borrowing money as it spends more than it brings in.

It has borrowed money at low interest rates - but these rates have increased.

£105 billion on servicing debt interest. When you are borrowing a lot of money, even a small change in the interest level will massively increase the actual amount of money we need to pay on interest

Some context from the OBR on the budget

https://obr.uk/forecasts-in-depth/brief-guides-and-explainers/public-finances/

Income: £1149 billlion
Spending: £1276 billion
Of which £104 billion is on interest payments
Deficit: £127 billion

We need either more income, less spending and reduced interest payments.

Great analogy!
Fully agree that investing in infrastructure is key to solving a lot of our current issues.

Everything is so short term-ist in the UK which is leading to our downfall.

It's certainly a subsidy in the hands of the recipient who gets a home to live in at below market rent. What else could it be?? For them, it's a very real discount, aka subsidy!

@JamSandwich27

I am fully aware that there are some people who genuinely can’t work and I don’t mean them. However, if I can work when I have epilepsy and can sometimes have up to 10 seizures a week, why can’t others? I work full time from home and there’s loads of WFH jobs.

Please if you have time check out my thread re. how disabled MNers manage to work!
I'm intrigued what sort of work you do/how you managed to get into work that is entirely WFH and presumably flexible enough to allow for seizures/recovery time.

Where should people be looking for all these WFH jobs?

That’s all very well for those who can afford to support their children and grandchildren - what happens to those children who receive no support?
They end up in a trap of massively high rent, high food costs and absolutely no chance of saving for a deposit. In addition wages in the UK are being suppressed, we are way behind other OECD countries (and can’t even relocate to Europe easily anymore).

These children will become very disillusioned adults and parties like Reform will swoop in promising them sunlit uplands.

In effect a new class of poor who can’t even work their way out of it.

A subsidy is a government intervention (direct or indirect) that attempts to reduce the cost of something surely, so to the extent that policy determines that property is let at below ‘market’ rent the Government has chosen to subsidise rent costs to a section of society. There’s nothing wrong with that, it’s the the right thing to do.

The cost of rent on a council house is probably what all rents should be in reality if a profit motive is not involved.

I had some uni debt - just missed tution fees - paid for my own wedding - save house deposit and have had no childcare help.

I do not see how my DC can do the same without some inheriance or help as over last 20 years all that got even harder to do and it's not been easy for us.

Our parents were supportive but not in position to financially help much - we in worse poistion then them at same age- we are further away from retirment with less good pensions with a mortage still - they'd paid there's off by now. Best we can do is offer a roof but wether that's near work for them who knows - not an area of high employment.

They stand a chance of inherting 1/4 of estate which will be mostly a house and possible 1/8 of another at most. Nothing guarantee as their DGP may need that money for their own care. They won't inherit likely from us till well past time it would help them. My kids do well educationally so stand a good chance of higher paying jobs - and yet will still likely need help.

I know many families with nothing to pass on - I do wonder if we continue to have high rents, house prices and cost of living how many will every get on.

My youngest adult DS has a friend who saved up a deposit from working in a minimum wage job from leaving school at 18. He lived in a room in a shared house and was very careful with his money often working long hours to get overtime pay. After 6 years he had saved enough for a deposit on his own with no partner. If people choose to live in the South where house prices are expensive that is their choice. No one forces them to live there. My eldest adult DS moved up to the North in order to buy a house because house prices were cheaper and he could get more for his money. Too many people are passive and don't try to find a way.

The banking crisis and COVID/Lockdown.
It’s got to be paid for.

I do live in the North and average house prices here are around £289000.

Minimum wage is £24k, so borrowing probably 4x annual wage only gives 100K. I can’t see anything on Right Move for that unless it’s in a very poor condition and needs gutting which will be hugely expensive due to rise in labour and material costs.

My parents would love to downsize but stamp duty makes it prohibitively expensive

@NeedToChangeName do they need to downsize to a more expensive property?

There are areas in the North eg Hull where you can buy a house for £100k maybe move to an area like this if he wants to buy a house. You must live in an expensive area. I'm in the Midlands and there are houses for £275k.

I found this property on the Rightmove Android app and wanted you to see it: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/158764682 Anything wrong with this?

If everyone moves to cheaper areas they don't tend to stay cheap though & there tends to be a requirement for housing to be near jobs or transport links that facilitate getting to jobs.

The accounts are separate. How many more times? Council tax goes nowhere near the housing account. 🙄

By law, all our financial activities as a housing landlord must be kept separate from our other finances. This means it is illegal for us pay for other services using money from our Housing Revenue Account, and vice versa

https://www.thurrock.gov.uk/how-we-plan-our-finances/housing-revenue-account

I give up.

Public transport is shocking here too - expensive and infrequent.

Modernisation required throughout and asbestos apparently. There’s always a reason something is really cheap.

I live in NZ and there is nowhere in the country where you could buy a house for that amount of money (meaning they cost more here) and our wages are not high.

'Modernisation required throughout'????

What is wrong with the world? That house is perfectly liveable in, and when I was young people lived in houses that required far more 'modernisation' than that house, and did any work as and when they could afford it. I can't help but start to lose sympathy with the young people whining about not being able to afford to buy a house - often what they mean is they can't afford to buy the perfect house.

I'm renting myself, and my flat is a 70s flat with no 'modernisation' other than a new bathroom - which only happened this year due to a leak which required the bath to be removed. The flat behind me still has the original bathroom.

That foam insulation can make it really hard to get a mortgage.

The house looks liveable otherwise.

Richard Murphy has interesting videos on YouTube. Also Gary Stephenson and doubtless others. The welfare state for banks and corporations is mind boggling. But I doubt anything will ever be done about it. I'm old enough to remember Gordon Brown promising to close the tax havens - most of which are under UK jurisdiction. As someone smarter than me put it ' we desire the ends but refuse to will the means'.
Can't borrow anymore , refuse to tax obscene wealth. Just leaves one option : stamp on the poor. And pretend there was no alternative.

No, they would be downsizing to smaller / cheaper, but don't wish to release ££ by selling and then a spend similar amount on stamp duty on purchase of new house. In that case, they would be no better off financially, with a smaller (cheaper) house to sell in due course

Makes more sense to rattle around in the bigger / more expensive house, and raise more money when it's eventually sold

I'm not sure of sums involved but they've done the maths

Roof looks like replacement needed too. That’s £10k at least.