English rent prices have reached another record high, growing by close to 10% in the past year, official figures show.

The typical private rental price in England rose 9.3% in the year up to November, costing £116 more than 12 months earlier, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

English renters paid an average of £1,362 last month – a steep increase from the 8.8% hike seen a month earlier.

UK rent rises were not far behind, growing 9.1% across the year, just below the record-high annual rise of 9.2% in March.

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Londoners saw the biggest rent raises. In the capital, rent bills were up 11.6%, bypassing the previous record high.

Cheaper housing could be found in Scotland and Wales during the period. Their mean monthly rents were £980, up 6.5% and £772, 8.0% higher respectively.

Data for Northern Ireland is only available up to September, during which period rents rose 9%.

Analysis by Sky News found most people in the UK were renters and mortgage holders were in the minority.

Rent increasing disproportionately

Rent increases far surpass house price rises, mortgage rates and the overall rate of inflation.

People remortgaging at the end of November could secure a typical five-year fixed deal for 5.28% or a two-year fixed deal for 5.52%.

Meanwhile, the consumer price index measure of inflation stood at 2.6%.

Also published on Wednesday were average house prices, which were far below rent increases.

Average UK house prices rose 3.4% in the year to October 2024. In England, house prices are up 3%, in Wales 4% and in Scotland 5.5%, the ONS said.

Why are prices rising?

The increase comes due to there being more renters than rental properties available, the National Residential Landlords Association (NRLA) said.

“The biggest pressure on rents remains a chronic shortage of housing to meet demand,” NLRA’s policy director Chris Norris said.

“According to Savills up to one million new homes to rent will be needed by 2031 to meet growing demand. Despite this, government data shows that one in three landlords are now planning to sell properties they rent out over the next two years.”

London Renters Union has been contacted for comment.

Inflation has risen for the second month in a row to 2.6% in November.

Today’s percentage is above the Bank of England’s 2% target and marks an increase from October, when inflation climbed to 2.3% after three months of decline.

This is due to the higher cost of clothing, petrol and diesel, compared to last year, the ONS said.

But how does all of this affect the cost of groceries, clothing and leisure activities? Use our calculator to find out.

Which prices are increasing fastest?

Olive oil was the item with the largest price increase, with prices for 500ml to one litre rising from £7.22 to £9.21, an increase of 28%.

Olive oil has consistently had high price increases and experts have put that price rise down primarily to poor olive yields due to last year’s heatwaves in southern Europe.

However, they expect a significantly better harvest in the 2024-25 season, thanks to significant rainfall in Spain. The harvest could be double the size of last year’s, which may lead to lower prices in the coming months.

With Christmas fast approaching, many festive staples are seeing price increases, with carrots and potatoes up by nearly a fifth. On the drinks front, a 70cl bottle of cream liqueur has risen by 4%, but there’s good news for Champagne lovers with a bottle now costing 0.5% less.

Food and drink products are responsible for seven of the 10 biggest increases since last year.

Of non-food items, hair gel increased the most, by a fifth from £3.33 to £4.11.

Top five price rises:

• Olive oil (500ml-1litre): up 28%, £7.22 to £9.21
• Iceberg lettuce (each): up 24%, 80p to 99p
• Hair gel (150-200ml): up 23%, £3.33 to £4.11
• Hand rolling tobacco pack (30g): up 22%, £20.46 to £24.97
• Plums (per kg): up 20%, £2.91 to £3.48

Overall, 50 of the 156 types of food and drink tracked by the ONS have actually become cheaper since last year.

Crumpet lovers have reason to celebrate-prices for a pack of 6-9 crumpets have dropped by 8%, along with some dairy-free spread to top them with.

Overall, 142 out of the 444 products in our database are cheaper than they were 12 months ago.

Top food price decreases:

• Pulses (390-420g): down 12%, 76p to 67p
• Frozen prawns (per kg): down 9%, £18.87 to £17.20
• Canned tomatoes (390-400g): down 8%, 72p to 66p
• Dairy free spread/margarine (450-500g): down 8%, £2.17 to £1.99
• Crumpets (pack of 6-9): down 8%, £1.00 to 92p

Of non-supermarket items, kerosene has been the biggest price faller – by a more than a fifth.

What is the effect of long-term inflation?

The price changes described above compare the cost of items to where they were a year ago.

However, inflation has now been at high levels for an extended period of time.

The war in Ukraine, COVID, Brexit, and other supply chain pressures have all contributed to spiralling costs in recent years.

Inflation reached a 40-year high of 11.1% in October 2022.

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While the headline inflation figure has come down markedly, any amount of inflation means that prices are still rising, and building on already inflated costs.

We’ve compared the costs of shopping items with what they were three years ago to see what the cumulative impact of inflation has been.

The biggest price rise for groceries over that time has been for olive oil (500ml to one litre), which has increased nearly two-and-a-half times (146%), from £3.74 to £9.21 in the past three years.

Iceberg lettuce is up by four-fifths, with one costing 99p now compared with 54p in October 2021.

Use our calculator to see how much prices in your shopping basket have risen in total since three years ago.

Who is worst affected?

Richard Lim, chief executive of Retail Economics, says: “It’s the least affluent households that are going to see much higher rates of inflation as they spend more of their income on food and energy.”

We’ll continue to update our spending calculator over the coming months so you can see how you’ll be affected.

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Methodology

The ONS collects these prices by visiting thousands of shops across the country and noting down the prices of specific items. There are upwards of 100,000 prices published every month, from more than 600 products.

The items that form the “official shopping basket” change each year to reflect how the purchasing habits of the population have changed. For example in March 2021, after a year of the pandemic, hand gel, loungewear bottoms and dumbbells were added, while canteen-bought sandwiches were among the items removed.

Where there aren’t the exact equivalent items available at a survey shop, ONS officials pick the best alternative and note that they’ve done this so it’s weighted correctly when the averages are worked out.

Shops are weighted as well, so the price in a major chain supermarket will have a greater impact on the average than an independent corner shop.

We will be updating these figures each month while the cost of living crisis continues.

During the pandemic, more of the survey was carried out over the phone and work is ongoing to digitise the system to be able to take in more price points by getting data from supermarket receipts, rather than making personal visits.

Data journalists: Daniel Dunford, Amy Borrett, Ben van der Merwe, Joely Santa Cruz and Saywah Mahmood
Interactive: Ganesh Rao
Design: Phoebe Rowe, Brian Gillingham

The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open-source information. Through multimedia storytelling, we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.

Sir Keir Starmer has defended a decision not to compensate women affected by changes to their retirement age – saying doing so would “burden” the taxpayer.

The prime minister said he understood the concerns of the Women Against State Pension Inequality – often known as Waspi women – but their demands were not affordable.

He was speaking after Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall issued an apology for a 28-month delay in sending out letters to those born in the 1950s impacted by state pension changes.

However, she said she doesn’t accept that compensation should be paid.

Follow politics latest: Reaction to Waspi decision

Ms Kendall said the “great majority of women knew the state pension age was increasing” and that a state-funded pay-out wouldn’t be “fair or value for taxpayers’ money'”.

The announcement was branded a “day of shame” by the Liberal Democrats, who accused the Labour government of “turning its back on millions of pension-age women who were wronged”.

In the mid-1990s, the government passed a law to raise the retirement age for women over a 10-year period to make it equal with men.

The coalition government then sped up the timetable as part of its cost-cutting measures.

The Waspi group say millions suffered financially as they were not given sufficient warning to prepare for the later retirement age.

Earlier this year, an investigation by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) found that thousands of women may have been adversely impacted by failures to adequately inform people of the change.

The watchdog suggested that women should receive compensation of between £1,000 and £2,950 – but the findings were not legally binding.

Read More:
What is a Waspi woman and what happened to them?

Ms Kendall said paying that would have cost up to £10.5 billion, which is not “fair or proportionate”.

She also said she did not agree that sending letters earlier would have made a difference, saying research given to the Ombudsman showed “only around a quarter of people who are sent unsolicited letters actually remember receiving them or reading them“.

However she did accept there was maladministration in communicating the changes and vowed to “learn all the lessons” so it did not happen again.

Speaking later to journalists, Ms Kendall said “real and concrete actions” were coming out of the report, including a “detailed action plan to make sure those sorts of delays never happen again”.

Speaking to reporters after the announcement, Sir Keir said: “I do understand, of course, the concern of the Waspi women. But also I have to take into account whether it’s right at the moment to impose a further burden on the taxpayer, which is what it would be.”

The Waspi campaign group hit out at the decision on X, reminding Ms Kendall that she had previously called for a “fair solution for all affected”.

Angela Madden, chairwoman of Waspi, said refusing to compensate them was a “bizarre and totally unjustified move”.

She added: “An overwhelming majority of MPs back Waspi’s calls for fair compensation and all options remain on the table. Parliament must now seek an alternative mechanism to force this issue on to the order paper so justice can be done.”

This may be as big a political blunder as chancellor’s winter fuel cut

Jon Craig

Chief political correspondent

@joncraig

When Liz Kendall declared in the Commons there’ll be no compensation for the so-called WASPI women, there were shouts of “shame!” from MPs.

And no wonder. Could this be as big a political blunder as Rachel Reeves axing winter fuel payments for pensioners? Potentially, yes, given the furious backlash already.

Yes, compensation was promised by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and his shadow chancellor John McDonnell in the run-up to the December 2019 general election.

Mr McDonnell promised a £58 billion compensation scheme designed to end a “historic injustice” and said a “debt of honour” was owed to women born in the 1950s.

And yes, Sir Keir Starmer fought this year’s election as a changed Labour Party. And no, there was no repeat of the Corbyn-McDonnell pledge in this year’s election manifesto.

But as recently as 2022 the prime minister told a caller in a radio phone-in: “This is a real injustice. We need to something about it.”

In 2019, when she was in Mr Corbyn’s shadow cabinet, Angela Rayner said the Tory government “stole this money” from women born in the 1950s and Labour would “right that injustice”.

But not only that, Liz Kendall herself attended a WASPI campaign event in 2019 and said: “This injustice can’t go on. I have been a longstanding supporter of the WASPI campaign…”

No surprise then, that many of Labour’s newly-elected MPs now feel betrayed. “It feels a bit like we assembled this enormous coalition at the election and now we’re just intent to taking an axe to it piece by piece,” one new Labour MP told Sky News.

If it was an injustice in 2019 and in 2022, surely it’s still an injustice? Should other groups battling against injustice – like sub-postmasters and infected blood victims – be worried now?

Labour MPs were among those who criticised the decision in the House of Commons.

Gareth Snell, for Stoke-on-Trent Central, said today was a “sad moment” and asked the government to re-think its position if the economy improves.

Brian Leishman, for Alloa and Grangemouth, said he was “appalled” at the refusal to compensate the women, calling it “an incredible let down”.