Interest rate hikes ‘net positive’ for economy but not everyone

Published

2 years ago

January 5, 2024

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Here’s a sentence which might sound a little odd: higher interest rates have been good news for the UK economy.

For the first time in many decades, the pain faced by borrowers from higher interest rates has been more than balanced out by the benefit experienced by savers from those interest rates.

If this sounds a little odd it’s partly because invariably, when people – the media, politicians and economists – talk about interest rates they focus unduly on one side of the equation: the plight of the borrower. And there’s an understandable reason for that: in previous “hiking cycles”, when the Bank of England raises interest rates, that pain has invariably outweighed the windfall.

Money latest: Mortgage price war ‘likely’ as 3% interest rates predicted

That was the case when borrowing rates were lifted in 1988; it was the case in 1996, in 2003 and in 2006.

In each case the overall impact, across the economy, on households’ balance sheets was negative.

But not so this time around.

According to the Resolution Foundation, the net income we’ve earned, across the economy, as a result of interest rates, has actually risen rather than fallen – up by a percentage point since rates started going up.

To put that into perspective, the “interest rate effect” on incomes in the late 1980s was -1.5 percentage points.

And what’s striking, when you compare the UK to the euro area and the US, is that we are a bit of an outlier: the interest rate effect, across the economy, was much more positive than it was in those two other areas.

This, says the Resolution Foundation, is at least part of the explanation for how the UK hasn’t yet slipped into the recession a lot of people anticipated this time last year.

Part of the explanation for this is that it so happened, in large part because of the pandemic lockdowns, that people began this hiking cycle with a lot of savings in their bank accounts – far more than usual.

The upshot was that, across the economy, the benefit from those savings (and savings rates went up very quickly – albeit not to the levels of borrowing rates) was greater than the impact on mortgages and loans. Another part of the explanation is that so far only around half of those with fixed-rate mortgages have re-fixed their loans.

But there are a few very important provisos here. The first and perhaps most important is that while the above is certainly true across the whole economy, there’s a dramatic difference of experience for different categories of people.

Those whose debts outweigh their savings (which in this case mostly means younger people) will certainly see a negative impact from higher rates. Those with far more savings than debts – the older segments of the population – will see a benefit. In other words, the pain and the dividends are not being equally shared out. The old are doing much better; the young are doing worse.

And there are two other provisos. The first is that this positive impact will begin to wear off as more and more people re-fix their mortgages and go up from low-interest rates to higher rates. Even though the typical fixed-rate deal has been coming down recently, it’s still far higher than it was two or five years ago.

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The final proviso is that none of the above takes into account the broader impact of the cost of living crisis.

Everyone is having to pay higher prices for nearly everything. And while the annual rate at which those prices are increasing (inflation) has decelerated, the level of prices remains more than 15% above where it was a couple of years ago.

That’s a painful adjustment for everyone. The good news is that the impact of rates – across the economy as a whole – has actually been positive rather than negative. But not everyone will be seeing the benefits.

UK

‘I’m deprived of my UK citizenship but I’m not a convicted terrorist’

Published

15 hours ago

August 24, 2025

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'I'm deprived of my UK citizenship but I'm not a convicted terrorist'

Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS) went from a jihadist movement once aligned to al Qaeda to forming the official government of Syria.

It was a monumental transformation for them, their country and the wider Middle East.

But potentially too for British people who went to Syria – and who were stripped of their citizenship as a result, on the grounds of national security.

Tauqir Sharif, better known as Tox, went to Syria in 2012 as an aid worker. He was accused of being part of a group affiliated with al Qaeda, which he denies, and the then-home secretary Amber Rudd deprived him of his British citizenship in 2017.

“As of now, I am deprived of my UK citizenship but I’m not a convicted terrorist – and the reason for that is because we refused, we boycotted, the SIAC [Special Immigration Appeals Commission] secret courts, which don’t allow you to see any of the evidence presented against you,” he said.

“And one of the things that I always called for was, look, put me in front of a jury, let’s have an open hearing.”

HTS is still a proscribed terrorist organisation but the British government has now established relations with it.

Foreign Secretary David Lammy travelled to Damascus to meet the jihadist-turned-Syrian interim president – the man who swapped his nom de guerre of al Jolani for Ahmed al Sharaa.

If the UK government takes HTS off the terror list, what does that mean for those who lost their citizenship after being accused of being part of it?

People who joined HTS are only a subset among the scores of people who have had their citizenship revoked – a tool the UK government has been quick to use.

According to a report by the Parliamentary Joint Human Rights Committee, the UK “uses deprivation of citizenship orders more than almost any country in the world”.

The peak of that was in 2017, and mainly in relation to Syria – especially in the case of people joining Islamic State, perhaps most famously Shamima Begum.

And because people cannot be made entirely stateless, and need to have a second nationality, or be potentially eligible for one, there are worries of racism in who the orders apply to.

Countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh offer dual nationality, whereas other nations do not. In 2022, the Institute of Race Relations said “the vast majority of those deprived are Muslim men with South Asian or Middle Eastern/North African heritage”.

Legal grey areas

Sky News submitted Freedom of Information requests to the Home Office asking for a breakdown of second nationalities of those deprived of citizenship, but was refused twice on national security grounds.

The independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, Jonathan Hall KC, told Sky News there are issues around transparency.

“I do think there is a problem when you have people whose relationship with the country that they’re left with is really technical and they may never have realised that they had that citizenship before and may never gone to that country,” he said.

“Me and my predecessors have all said, owing to how frequently this power is used, it should be something that the independent reviewer should have the power to review. I asked, my predecessor asked, we’ve both been told no, so I agree there’s a lack of transparency.”

No automatic reversal

Even if the government does remove HTS from the terror list, it would not automatically invalidate decisions to deprive people of their citizenship.

Macer Gifford gave up a career as a banker in London to join the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) as a foreign volunteer between 2015 and 2017.

He told Sky News that decisions “made years ago in the interest of the British public have to remain”.

“We can’t sort of go through previous cases nitpicking through it, wasting time and money to bring it up to date,” he added.

“We can’t be naive because the intent to go out, the decision to go in itself is a huge decision for them. So it shows commitment when they’re there, they then, if they take an active participation in the organisations that they’ve been accused of joining, again, that involves training and perseverance and dedication to the cause.”

But those born and raised in Britain, who joined the same cause, and lost their citizenship as a result, might reasonably ask why that should remain the case.

UK

Criminals could be banned from pubs and sports grounds under new plans

Published

15 hours ago

August 24, 2025

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Criminals could be banned from pubs and sports grounds under new plans

Criminals face being banned from pubs, sports grounds and concerts under new government plans to give judges powers to pass tougher community sentences.

The new measures, which would apply to people in England and Wales, “should remind all offenders that, under this government, crime does not pay”, Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said.

Offenders’ freedom could also be curtailed with limits on driving, travel bans and restriction zones confining them to specific areas, the government said.

Similar measures could also apply to prisoners let out on licence, while drug testing would be expanded to include all those released, rather than just those with a history of substance misuse.

While judges are currently able to impose limited bans for specific crimes, such as football bans for crimes committed inside a stadium on match day, the new measures would allow for such bans to be handed down for any offence.

The justice secretary said: “When criminals break society’s rules, they must be punished.

“Those serving their sentences in the community must have their freedom restricted there too.

“These new punishments should remind all offenders that, under this government, crime does not pay.

“Rightly, the public expect the government to do everything in its power to keep Britain safe, and that’s what we’re doing.”

The proposals are part of the Labour government’s efforts to tackle overcrowding in prisons.

Back in June, it emerged that prisoners were to be transferred to lower security jails in an effort to ease overcrowding, as part of a new measure quietly unveiled by the government.

Sky News reported earlier this month how the prison system was close to collapse on a number of occasions between autumn 2023 and summer 2024, according to an independent review by former chief inspector of prisons, Dame Anne Owers.

The report said there was a systemic problem which has led to recurring prison capacity crises over the last 18 years.

UK

Police separate anti-immigration and anti-racism protesters across the country

Published

1 day ago

August 23, 2025

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Police separate anti-immigration and anti-racism protesters across the country

Protesters have gathered across the country as groups demonstrated against asylum seeker housing and were met by anti-racism campaigners.

Demonstrations under the Abolish Asylum System slogan were held in England, Scotland and Wales, including in Bristol, Exeter, Tamworth, Cannock, Aberdeen, Mold, Perth, Nuneaton, Liverpool, Wakefield, Newcastle, Horley and Canary Wharf.

Counter-protests were also organised by campaign group Stand Up to Racism.

In Bristol, mounted police separated the two groups in the Castle Park, with officers scuffling with protesters.

Police kept around 200 anti-immigration protesters draped in English flags away from roughly 50 Stand Up to Racism protesters in Horley, Surrey.

One man, wearing a West Ham United football shirt, was held by police as he yelled: “You’re not welcome here, you’re not welcome here, you’re not welcome here” at anti-racism protesters.

Anti-immigration protesters also chanted: “Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, Tommy Robinson” in support of the far-right activist, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon.

The anti-racism protesters chanted “say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here” and held signs calling for solidarity and to “stop deportations”.

The Stand Up to Racism protesters were shepherded into a smaller area as they continued to chant: “No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here”, which was met with “No they’re f****** not” from the other side of the street.

In Perth, protesters gathered outside the Radisson Hotel.

The anti-migration protesters held up signs with slogans such as “Perth is full – empty the hotels” and “get them out”.

Stand Up to Racism Scotland said it had achieved “victory” in Perth, with more than 200 gathering to oppose the Abolish Asylum System demonstration.

In Liverpool, a dispersal order was issued to try and contain the protests.

Saturday’s events come amid continued tension around the use of the hotels for asylum seekers.

Regular protests had been held outside the Bell Hotel in Epping, Essex, which started after an asylum seeker housed there was charged with sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl on 10 July.

Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu, 38, was charged with trying to kiss a teenage girl and denies the allegations. He is due to stand trial later this month.

In the wake of those protests, Epping Forest District Council sought and won an interim High Court injunction to stop migrants from being accommodated there – a decision which the government is seeking permission to appeal.