Support us

News Opinion Sport Culture Lifestyle

It's your choice

When we make the Guardian available to you
The
online, weheat or eat
and our diaries
partners may use cookies and
We live on cereal and soup, I ration washing my
similar technologiesYes,
to help us to do this. Some are
I’m happy
necessary to help our website work properly and
hair 8 what else can I give up to survive?
can't be switched off, and some are optional but
No,and
thank you
Siobhan
support the Guardian your experience in other
ways. To do this we work with a cross section of 76
partners. Manage cookies

Tax cuts for the rich is Liz Truss’s solution to all this, when what me and my dad
really need is an action plan

This article is part of the heat or eat diaries: a series from the frontline of
Britain’s cost of living emergency
Sat 27 Aug 2022 09.00 BST
:
 1 year old

There’s nothing more I can do to save energy – we’re already frugal

because we’re already poor. We already don’t leave lights on. We don’t
leave devices on or plugged in. I’ll always put on a jumper instead of
turning up the heating. When it gets to real winter, we have the
thermostat set at about 13. We use hot-water bottles, blankets, jumpers,
big socks. I don’t cook meals or have the oven on much – I’ll microwave
noodles instead. My dad eats mainly cereal, as well as tinned soups,
pasta – poor people’s food. I already only wash my hair once a week. I
can’t go out any less. I can’t drink less, I barely ever drink now anyway.
There’s nothing more I can give up at this point. I can’t live any less.

Right now my dad gets through about £15 a week of electricity. He

doesn’t have any gas. His electricity is basically the kettle, the
immersion heater and the telly. When winter comes, he’ll be using
space heaters to keep warm. The insulation in his flat is terrible. When
his neighbours use their washing machine, things fall off the shelves –
the whole place is basically made of cardboard and bogies so it’s hard to
keep it warm. If we’re looking at bills doubling or tripling this winter –
£250 or £300 seems possible – I don’t know how he would pay it. The
first thing he’d scrimp on is food – and he cannot lose any more weight.
The next step would be for him to move in with me.

More on this topic My rent is also going up from £300 a month to £350.
What is the Bills are included in that, but it doesn’t begin to
energy price cap cover my landlord’s rise in energy bills, so I don’t
and could I end
know what he’ll do in the long term. Last year the
up paying even
more? quarterly bills for March to May were £380 for gas
and £517 for electricity. This year it was £717 and
£916.
Advertisement
:
 It’s a niggling worry that never goes away – although in some ways it’s
just a more intense version of what life is always like when you’re poor.
Every month you don’t know if you’re going to make it to the next
payday. On one level it’s novel that, for once, everyone is in the same
boat.

But then there’s the rage. So much talk, all these figures that have been
bandied about and possible refunds and rebates and loans. All the time,
the uncertainties pile up. We have a zombie government and two
possible leaders who will never have to live with this. They have never
been poor. They’ve never even been poor students. They’ve never even
played at being poor! Liz Truss is the favourite and her biggest promise
is to cut taxes? That makes me livid! Read the room. Half the country is
worrying about keeping warm in winter. The NHS is on its knees. We’re
lacking coppers. Railway workers are on strike. And she’s talking about
:
 helping the richest people stay rich?
Advertisement

There has been extra financial help in small random bursts. Dad and I
both got an automatic payment into our account which will probably
pay for a month’s electricity, then we’re back to square one. Then I got a
letter from the council inviting me to go to the post office with ID and I
was handed £150 in cash – it was like the 80s! I think that was a one-off
welfare assistance scheme.

All that is much better than nothing, but it’s the lack of security, the lack
of policy that’s hard to live with. You never know what’s coming or
what’s not coming, and when both possible future leaders make vague
promises about “help being available for those that need it”, you want
facts, details, an action plan.
:
 In the meantime, one thing I can’t stand is any advice from MPs or
“experts” on how to save money. I don’t want to be told how to cook or
what I should buy for 30p, or ways to keep warm, or the best tricks to
save electricity. Why do they think they can be poor better than I can?
I’ve done it for a lifetime.
Advertisement

As told to Anna Moore. Siobhan is in her 30s and lives in the

Midlands. Names have been changed
Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you
would like to submit a letter of up to 300 words to be considered for
publication, email it to us at guardian.letters@theguardian.com

Topics
UK cost of living crisis / The heat or eat diaries
:
 Poverty / Conservative leadership / comment

View on theguardian.com
:
 About us All topics
Contact us All writers
Complaints and corrections Modern Slavery Act
SecureDrop Digital newspaper archive
Work for us Facebook

Privacy settings Twitter

Privacy policy
Cookie policy
Terms & conditions
Help

Advertise with us Support the Guardian

Search jobs Support us

Patrons

Back to top
© 2024 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.
: