Cold comfort

Mitigating the Winter Fuel Payment cut

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The announcement that Winter Fuel Payments are to be restricted to recipients of Pension Credit or similar means-tested benefits has sparked controversy[1]. The Government and its defenders point to the lack of sense, in these straitened times, of making fuel payments to all pensioners when the majority do not need them. Opponents, however, highlight the … Continued

Building blocks

Assessing the role of planning reform in meeting the Government’s housing targets

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The Government has prioritised planning reform as its key policy lever to deliver an ambitious target of 1.5 million additional homes by the end of this Parliament. This note explores the extent to which the proposed reforms to the planning system will help reach this target, while also highlighting other constraints on housing supply that … Continued

Blowing away the competition

What to make of Britain’s 2024 renewable energy auction results

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The latest round of renewable energy auctions procured a record 9.6 gigawatts (GW) of low-carbon energy, of which the majority (5 GW) was offshore wind. This represents a much-needed acceleration towards the new Government’s ambitious decarbonisation targets and was essential given the failure of last year’s auction. This is good news: as well as quickly … Continued

Electric dreams

How can we decarbonise electricity without disadvantaging poorer families?

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A low carbon electricity system will underpin the UK’s journey to net zero, making the electricity we use today greener but also fuelling our cars and keeping us warm at home in decades to come. But this overhaul of our energy system requires a significant step change in investment, with the costs of this spending … Continued

Back for more?

Putting the 2024 Spring Budget in context

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In this briefing note, we put the decisions in the Spring Budget 2024 in context, discussing how the economic outlook has changed, what that means for the public finances, and how the policy decisions taken at the Budget will affect living standards in both the short and the medium term.

A pre-election Statement

Putting the Autumn Statement 2023 in context

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In this briefing note, we put the decisions in the 2023 Autumn Statement in context, discussing how the economic outlook has changed, what that means for the public finances, and how the policy decisions taken will affect living standards in both the short and the medium term.

Preparing the pitch

Autumn Statement 2023 preview

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In our Autumn Statement preview slidepack, we assess the economic outlook ahead of Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement on November 22nd, and explore the policy choices facing the Chancellor as inflation drives up tax revenues, and interest rates drive up the cost of government debt. We find that the Chancellor is in difficult terrain: although the … Continued

Gotta get through this

Energy bills this winter

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Britain’s energy bill crisis is not over: Ofgem’s imminent confirmation of the Q4 2023 price cap is expected to show that annualised typical energy bills will be above £1,900 from October, close to double those before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and only a little below the effective level of £2,100 from last winter that resulted … Continued

It’s getting hot in here

How ever-warmer UK summer temperatures will have an outsized impact on low-income households and low-paid workers

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Although the UK’s summer of 2023 has been something of a washout so far, the country is getting hotter, with temperatures over 40oC – first experienced in the UK in 2022 – set to become the norm. Hotter weather will impact different people in different ways, so this Spotlight explores what it means for Brits … Continued

Where the rubber hits the road

Reforming vehicle taxes

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This briefing note examines the future of motoring taxes, which need extensive reform given the necessary and welcome rise of electric vehicles. We detail a suite of policies that will protect revenues and lower income households, reduce congestion, and facilitate the transition to zero-carbon motoring. 

Hitting a brick wall

How the UK can upgrade its housing stock to reduce energy bills and cut carbon

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This briefing note considers how policy makers should square up to one the hardest part of the net zero challenge: insulating the nation’s homes. It highlights an overlooked problem, the 9 million walls that need insulating at considerable costs, and proposes a series of new regulations to ensure progress is made by 2035, lowering carbon emissions and cutting energy bills in the process.

Help today, squeeze tomorrow

Putting the 2022 Autumn Statement in context

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This report presents Resolution Foundation’s analysis of the 2022 Autumn Statement. In the face of grim economic and fiscal forecasts, Jeremy Hunt announced energy support today but tougher times tomorrow, with stealth tax rises for the middle and top of the income distribution followed by spending cuts after the next election.

Mind the (credibility) gap

Autumn Statement preview

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In our Autumn-Statement preview slidepack, we present new analysis that explores the economic outlook ahead of the Autumn Statement on 17 November, and the critical decisions that the new Prime Minister and Chancellor must make. With the latest political turmoil triggered by attempts to completely rewrite economic policy, Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt are under … Continued

Cutting tax cuts

Jeremy Hunt rewrites Government’s economic policy

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The new Chancellor has rewritten UK economic policy in order to reduce the pressure on the Bank of England to raise interest rates and the Treasury to deliver spending cuts. He has now reversed 60 per cent of the tax cuts announced less than four weeks ago and committing to scale back support for energy … Continued

A blank cheque

An analysis of the new cap on energy prices

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Liz Truss’s first major act as Prime Minister was to set out a huge energy support package to reduce the scale of the living standards’ catastrophe this winter, with the Energy Price Guarantee (EPG) as its highlight. The EPG will mean that annual energy prices for the typical household are capped at £2,500 for two … Continued

A chilling crisis

Policy options to deal with soaring energy prices

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This briefing note, released just ahead of the announcement of the winter 2022 energy price cap level, looks at the implications of an unprecedented jump in energy costs on low-to-middle income households, stresses the need for urgent and novel policy thinking to lessen this blow, and outlines how this could take shape.

Cutting back to keep warm

Why low-income households will have to cut back on spending by three times as much as high-income households this winter

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This winter, low-income households will have to reduce their spending by three times as much as high-income households in order to afford their energy bills – a situation that is particularly concerning now that we know energy bills in January-March 2023 are set to be an annualised £4,266, rather than the £2,800 expected earlier this … Continued

Back on target

Analysis of the Government’s additional cost of living support

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The Chancellor yesterday announced a big and well-targeted package of energy bill support. Of the £15 billion of new measures, almost double that announced earlier in the year, twice as much will go to households in the bottom half of the income distribution as the top half. This fills the gaping hole left by the … Continued

Monetary policy
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Fiscal policy
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Macroeconomic policy

Crunch time

Bank of England raises rates again and signals cost of living crisis is set to deliver a £1,200 hit to incomes

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Today the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee raised rates at a fourth successive meeting – a first in the 25 years since it was granted independence – to 1 per cent, a level not seen since the financial crisis. The direct impact of this change in rates on households will be small in the … Continued

Low energy

The British Energy Security Strategy brings increased ambition on decarbonising electricity but fails to offer immediate respite from high energy costs

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The Government’s British Energy Security Strategy was charged with reducing national exposure to imported hydrocarbons and bringing down energy bills for already-stretched households. Announcements on the supply side were a mixed bag, with high ambition on nuclear and offshore wind but minimal progress on lower cost onshore wind and solar. Overall, these efforts – culminating … Continued

Stressed out

April brings an acute squeeze on UK living standards as higher energy bills lead to widespread fuel stress

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April 2022 will see the UK’s cost of living crisis intensify as energy prices jump by more than half overnight, pushing 5 million English households into fuel stress, even accounting for support measures recently announced by the Chancellor. This is not the end, though. Against a backdrop of the highest inflation rate in 40 years … Continued

Briefing note cover - living wage uk

Inflation Nation

Putting Spring Statement 2022 in context

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This briefing note provides an assessment of the measures announced in the March 2022 Spring Statement.  The Chancellor approached this with the highest inflation in 40 years and the worst income squeeze on record lying ahead of us.  Against that backdrop, and with plenty of fiscal ammunition (thanks to the Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR’s) … Continued

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