It's Doom and Gloom on The Telegraph today

[AtW]

Where is DimPrawn today? Has someone superglued a £1 coin on the pavement outside his house again?

[MarillionFan]

Thank you for filling in for DimPrawn while he is away without leave. I haven't believed government inflation figures since never. The real inflation rate, in terms of a pound's spending power, must be > 30% including the pound's drop in value.

Where is DimPrawn today? Has someone superglued a £1 coin on the pavement outside his house again?

[TimberWolf]

Thank you for filling in for DimPrawn while he is away without leave. I haven't believed government inflation figures since never. The real inflation rate, in terms of a pound's spending power, must be > 30% including the pound's drop in value.

[Churchill]

Good news doesn't sell.

[Sysman]

Mortgage prisoners

They cannot move home to follow work or accommodate larger families because financial regulators are forcing banks and building societies to ‘shut the stable door after the horse has bolted’.

New rules imposed after these homebuyers arranged their original mortgages mean they are not allowed to carry them over to buy a new property – or, in the jargon, ‘port’ the loan. So, they must either pay early redemption penalties, usually between 3pc and 5pc of loan value and
running into thousands of pounds, or stay where they are.

Gas and electricity price shock shows the Government measure of inflation is meaningless

When other utilities follow Scottish Power’s price hike, which will push up gas bills by 19pc and electricity costs by 10pc, the Government’s preferred measure of inflation – the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) – will be seen as meaningless.

Unlike the CPI, which inexplicably excludes mortgage costs – which is the biggest single outgoing in many household budgets – the RCLI measures how rising monthly bills for homeloans are hitting millions of people in the pocket.

Similarly, the CPI excludes council tax from its estimate of the cost of living as if this impost were an optional extra. If only it were. Sadly, it is nothing of the kind. Indeed, this is one of the few items in any realistic assessment of the cost of living where, if you refuse to pay it, you will end up in court.

Given the way council tax has soared since 1997, it is difficult to avoid the suspicion that it has been kept out of the CPI for reasons of political expediency.