Shopping Price Increases

Apparently there are some veg shortages in supermarkets because they (the supermarkets) wont pay the (British) producers the fair price they are asking. The shortages are not because the British produce isn't available. The supermarkets were selling some food products such as milk for less than independent ‘milkmen’ who did door step deliveries could buy it. This resulted in the demise of doorstep milk deliveries in many areas.

MaizieD

In the matter of benefits, the Joseph Rowntree Report makes grim reading

www.jrf.org.uk/report/uk-poverty-2023#key-findings

But if supermarkets continue to push down the prices they pay to producers, or carry on making farmers subsidise the offers on fresh foods, the farmers will be the ones living in poverty and will give up altogether.

We cannot keep importing more and more fresh food because other European countries are prepared to pay higher prices and it will end up as more than just a short glitch of no tomatoes and cucumbers.

ExperiencedNotOld

Casdon - if I said black was black would you have to contradict? It’s got nothing to do with NMW, it’s got to do with an employer seeking to pay what they think is deserved. And where does the money come from? It comes from people paying more for their shopping.

No, ExperiencedNotOld, I just like accuracy in posts. That’s not unreasonable I don’t think.

Casdon - if I said black was black would you have to contradict? It’s got nothing to do with NMW, it’s got to do with an employer seeking to pay what they think is deserved. And where does the money come from? It comes from people paying more for their shopping.

It’s an interesting topic when you start digging (I know, I’m sad, but I like to know these things)
www.grocerygazette.co.uk/2023/02/22/supermarket-pay-rate-2023/
Here’s the latest comparison I could find. It says Tesco has invested £450m in the past year on improving wages - with profits of £2.4bn, presumably after wage rises are taken into account. Ashamed to say I had to look it up, a billion is 1000 million. So, it’s less than 20% percent of the profits going to benefit staff, at least at Tesco. I expect the others are similar.

I agree with you on fuel prices JaxJacky, I’m sure that’s a much more significant factor because it affects right through the food chain,

I know Asda’s went up on 17th February, however I entirely agree with your point on wages. Fuel costs do have a bigger hit though, felt throughout the supply chain, in particular smaller retailers.

Jaxjacky

But some have increased wages already Casdon Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Aldi did so this month.
We all know too fuel costs have risen significantly, so heating of stores, offices, warehouses along with refrigeration all add to the end price.

They have announced new rates and that’s great, but they nearly all pay very low wages though JaxJacky, I honestly don’t think in the scheme of things that giving staff a pay increase is a major factor in prices going up. For example Tesco profits are predicted to be between £2.4bn and £2,5bn this year. With the pay rise, staff will get £11.02 per hour from April. I haven’t checked the others, but expect some of the pay rises they have announced are also effective from April

But some have increased wages already Casdon Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Aldi did so this month.
We all know too fuel costs have risen significantly, so heating of stores, offices, warehouses along with refrigeration all add to the end price.

ExperiencedNotOld

You do realise that rising grocery prices are also driven by wage increases in the supermarkets. That’s the vicious circle at play. Get paid more but to live costs more.

The minimum wage doesn’t rise until 1st April 2023 ExperiencedNotOld, so increased wages are not a significant reason for price increases, and meanwhile profits have risen.

You do realise that rising grocery prices are also driven by wage increases in the supermarkets. That’s the vicious circle at play. Get paid more but to live costs more.

In the matter of benefits, the Joseph Rowntree Report makes grim reading

www.jrf.org.uk/report/uk-poverty-2023#key-findings

I don't know about Wales, but I do know that some analysis of the Scottish economy has shown that they could support themselves.

There are some very strange cost allocations made in the GERs analysis by the Treasury. Like Scotland being charged a far greater percentage for some costs than the population of Scotland as a percentage of the UK population actually justifies. And some odd allocations of revenue, too.

I can't go into detail. You'd have to look for analyses by economists that challenge the official one.

paddyanne might know more.

Germanshepherdsmum

It only applies if you are already on certain benefits.

Exactly. I know from one person I help. The money is coming through automatically.

I buy more supermarket own brands and get more basic things without the so called luxuries and treats. I just go shopping once per week. I make things like lentil and veg soup from scratch. Expensive makeup and toiletries aren't worth it, the cheap stuff is just as good.

Germanshepherdsmum

Do none of you get anything from England in return? If you just kept your electricity and taxes to yourselves and had nothing whatsoever, not one penny, from England, and had to stand entirely on your feet, what then?

Of course we do, I wasn’t intending to give the impression that I’m anti England, because I’m not. Wales would struggle without English tourists, they are a big source of income, and we are a net financial gainer from being part of the UK. Our natural resources are what makes the country productive and attractive, we have low population because of the mountains making much of the land unsuitable for crops or industry.

Do none of you get anything from England in return? If you just kept your electricity and taxes to yourselves and had nothing whatsoever, not one penny, from England, and had to stand entirely on your feet, what then?

Should have said, it’s because of the way the national grid operates, distributing to the whole of the UK via the shortest routes at any given time of day.

I did fact check! It’s because we send more of ours to England though paddyann54, not because we need Scottish electricity - we export ours too.

If you fact check you'll find we send electricity to Wales

paddyann54

Young couple in my street have two small children ,both have athsma ,the mum was telling me that energy prices are crippling them,they cant have a cold house as it affects the wee ones breathing and they are currently spending over £600 a month to keep it at a stable 20 degrees .
Its shocking .Prices in Norway are around £36 a month for a friends daughters family .Norway is, like Scotland, an energy producer and mainly renewables .WE produce enough electricity to power not just ourselves but swathes of England and parts of Wales .So why the hell are we being penalised by the Energy companies that are making a huge amount of money out of us via the "British " government?

Wales is already a net exporter of electricity, having generated approximately 23.1 TWh in 2020 while consuming 13.8 TWh paddyann54, so we don’t need any from Scotland. We export water too, but we don’t have gas though.

Scary stuff M0nica.

Moonwatcher You are making the mistake that so many people make of confusing the Energy supply companies and the energy producing companies.

The companies supplying and distributing gas to customers have made little or no profit over the past year. British Gas have made £10 per customer. As you know a huge number of small energy supply only companies went bust about a year ago, for just this reason.

The huge sums of money are made by the energy producing companies because the energy they supply is sold at auction and at times like the present, when less gas is coming from Russia this pushes prices up, like tomatoe prices in supermarkets.

However companies that both supply energy and produce it, like Centrica, EDF, Shell are not allowed to use the huge profits from producing energy to subsidise the supply side. For the simple reason that if they did that they would immediately drive out of business companies that supply energy but do not produce it, so would no longer beable to compete with the producer/suppliers on price. Companies like Octopus and Ovo, who do not, I think produce any energy.

The conundrum posed by the two sides of the energy industry, supply close to unprofitable, production, incredibly profitable is one the government must solve and, personally, I think a properly structured and thought through excess profits levy is the way forward. the other way forward is to produce more of our own power from our own resources and from a diverse range of sources, so we are less dependent on oil and gas.

Norway's Sovereign Wealth fund is both a blessing to Norway and a curse to many of the countries it invests in. From the beginning Norway set profits aside into what became known as 'Sovereign Wealth Fund'. It is not allowed to invest in Norway in case it destabilised the economy.

Since Norway formed this fund many other smaller countries where a natural product is generating huge profits have set up similar funds. Most Middle Eastern countries have them. All of them are not allowed to invest in their own economies.

As a result they have gone round the world buying up successful businesses, and they run them to make sure the returns to the Sovereign wealth fund is as large as possible and they do not give a toss for the people whose employment earns the money, nor the consumers who buy the products.

Read this, and see how much of British industry is owned by Gulf sovereign wealth funds www.trtworld.com/magazine/gulf-ownership-of-uk-assets-raise-questions-over-undue-influence-45908 and then be afraid, very afraid.

It's a very sad state of affairs.
maddy we have noticed that the donation bins have reduced their contents drastically.
We buy a lot of supermarket own brands where we can but even these prices have risen immensely.
It angers me when you hear of energy making vast amounts and yet our bills keep going up. We are with EON and every so often they do an energy saving event because we have a smart meter. You use as little as you can for an hour and earn some money off your bill. We sat in the dark with no tv, water heater off and no heating on. All we got was £3.80.
We have underfloor heating but it's been off for most of the winter because we can't afford to have it on all the time. We bought a oil filled radiator to heat the one room and an electric blanket which has saved us a lot.
There doesn't seem much end in sight and now shortages of fruit and veg.

M0nica

Benefit rises come in in early April. This will help those struggling on the state pension. How much help those under state pension will receive I do not know.

Mum’s state pension will go up by just over ten per cent, she’s thrilled by that, it’s really a good rise.
Shopping at Aldi or Lidl and using the pound shop helps a lot, so does buying things from charity shops.