Economic Tsunami Brews for Britain: Petrol, Interest Rates and Unemployment BNP News
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The inevitable consequence of decades of economic mismanagement has resulted in a triple whammy of rises in petrol, unemployment rates and an expected interest rate rise breaking over Britain.Last week, unleaded petrol in Britain reached an average price of £1.21 per litre and experts warned that it could reach £1.30 within a few months.
A large proportion of this money already goes in tax. Currently, 56.19 pence of each litre price of unleaded petrol and diesel is tax.
This compares to 65.91 pence per litre for leaded petrol, 36.19 pence per litre for biodiesel and bioethanol, 22.16 pence per kilogramme for road fuel natural gas and 27.67 pence per kilogramme for road fuel liquefied petroleum gas ('LPG').
By way of contrast, petrol prices in many European countries have fallen by two percent in the last week. In Britain, the price of unleaded petrol has risen by 12 pence per litre since the beginning of the year, which has increased the average two-car family fuel bill by an extra £25 a month.
At the same time, the number of British people out of work has reached its highest level since 1971.
According to figures from the Office for National Statistics, some 10 million people are now classed as “economically inactive” and the number of unemployed has climbed to more than 2.5 million.
Youth unemployment has also increased with the number of 16 to 24-year-olds out of work climbing by 18,000 to 941,000.
While the Bank of England has kept interest rates at 0.5 percent for the last year, experts have predicted that they will rise early in the New Year.
Any rise will immediately cause huge problems for already overstretched consumers and some charities have predicted that more than five million homeowners will lose their homes within the next 12 months.
According to Campbell Robb, chief executive of Shelter, some “5.4 million mortgage holders haven’t even thought about how they will pay their mortgage if interest rates go up.
“We know for a significant number of people, just keeping on top of their current mortgage repayments is a constant struggle,” Mr Robb was quoted as saying.
* The most important thing to be done to bring the economy under control again is to slash Government spending.
However, the new Con-Dem regime is as determined as its predecessor to increase spending on major outlays which are not in the state’s interests, such as the Afghanistan war, foreign aid, EU membership, immigration and asylum.
Only the British National Party has called for a halt to these expenditures. Taken together, these cuts will slice billions off the budget.
