Cost of living: The areas most likely to struggle with access to affordable food
People living in areas of Birmingham and Liverpool are most likely to struggle with access to affordable food, according to new research.
Low income and a lack of large supermarkets and online shopping are making it more difficult for Britons to shop around and find healthy and affordable food to eat, according to data from Which?
The consumer watchdog, alongside the University of Leeds, has identified the places around the UK where households are most likely to be in need of extra support to put food on the table.
The Priority Places for Food Index has ranked local areas by the likelihood of people needing extra support.
Constituencies in Birmingham and Liverpool feature heavily at the top of the index. Just three of the top 20 worst affected regions are in Wales, with the remaining 17 in England – predominantly in the North East.
Birmingham Hodge Hill is considered the worst – with 100% of its local areas in need of extra support.
Which? found the area has poor online delivery access, high levels of fuel poverty and people in the area having a low income or no car access.
When Which? visited a food bank in the local area, volunteer David Fletcher said: “Where this food bank is, there’s no supermarket within two miles.”
Knowsley in Merseyside is the second highest ranking constituency for needing support according to the analysis, with low income, fuel poverty and an exceptionally high need for family food support in 96% of its local areas.
It also has relatively low levels of nearby supermarkets with half the number of large or very large supermarkets compared to the national average, indicating affordable food may be harder to find locally.
One local resident said “often cheaper products are unavailable with only more expensive options left” at their local supermarket.
The top five worst affected areas in England were: Birmingham Hodge Hill, Knowsley, Houghton and Sunderland South, Birmingham Northfield and Birmingham and Perry Barr.
Liz Truss’s constituency makes top 20
A number of the worst-affected constituencies have high-profile MPs on both sides of the divide attached to them.
South West Norfolk, the constituency of former prime minister Liz Truss, ranks 20th in England and 24th overall. In the constituency – which has a limited supermarket and non-supermarket retail provision – 70% of local areas are priority places.
Dehenna Davison, a minister for levelling up, is also the MP for Bishop Auckland, which ranks 11th in England and 12th overall.
Bridget Phillipson, Labour’s shadow minister for education, represents Houghton and Sunderland South, which sits third on the list.
Of the top 20 regions across the UK, four are represented by Conservative MPs, with the rest Labour-held seats.
The top 30 worst affected areas – all of which are in England (16) and Wales (4)
Areas at risk in Welsh Valleys
Overall, seven in 10 UK parliamentary constituencies have at least one area in need of urgent help accessing affordable food – but there are 16 constituencies across England and Wales for which at least three-quarters of the constituency are at risk.
In Wales, Which? found the highest concentration of areas at high risk during the food crisis were in the Valleys where proximity to a large supermarket or access to online deliveries may be very poor.
Wales has a higher proportion of rural places where accessing affordable food is an issue than England and Scotland.
The five worst-affected areas in Wales were Rhondda, Blaenau Gwent, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney, Cynon Valley and Neath.
In Scotland, the places in highest need of support were in the Central Belt, according but there is also a notable concentration in and around Dundee where there is relatively poor access to online food deliveries and people are more likely to be suffering from fuel poverty and on a low income.
The top five worst-affected regions in Scotland were North Ayrshire and Arran, West Dunbartonshire, Kilmarnock and Loudoun, Glasgow North East and Glenrothes.
Northern Ireland has the most even geographical spread of areas in need of support accessing affordable food. However, there is a noticeably greater concentration in parts of southwest Belfast and in and around Derry/Londonderry.
The five worst-affected areas in Northern Ireland were East Londonderry, Foyle, West Tyrone, North Antrim, Belfast West.
Calls for supermarkets to do more
The consumer group is calling on supermarkets to do more to support people through the crisis, by making sure food prices are easy to understand, with straightforward price reductions, and that budget lines consist of healthy choices.
Previous Which? research found most people have been forced to change their shopping habits, with millions skipping meals and turning to foodbanks to feed themselves.
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Sue Davies, head of food policy at Which?, said: “Our new research tells us where around the UK support is most urgently needed.
“The supermarkets have the ability to take action and make a real difference to communities all around the UK. That’s why we’re calling on them to ensure everyone has easy access to budget food ranges that enable healthy choices, can easily compare the price of products to get the best value and that promotions are targeted at supporting people most in need.”
Michelle Morris, associate professor of nutrition and lifestyle analytics at the University of Leeds, said: “With so many people in the UK already suffering from food insecurity and the cost of living crisis making that much worse, we need to do all that we can to support those most in need to access affordable, healthy and sustainable foods.”
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Police investigating criminal offence after Daily Telegraph columnist ‘dumbfounded’ by social media post probe
Essex Police say they are investigating an alleged criminal offence of inciting racial hatred, after Daily Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson said she was “dumbfounded and upset” when officers knocked on her door last Sunday.
Ms Pearson revealed she was told she was being investigated over a year-old deleted post online.
She said she wasn’t informed which post had been reported, but suggested it could have been related to the 7 October attacks in Israel or pro-Palestine marches.
She claimed the officers told her she was being investigated for a NCHI (a none crime hate incident) an incident involving an act which is perceived to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards persons with a particular characteristic, but is not illegal.
NCHI reports have long been controversial, with many citing free speech concerns, and Ms Pearson’s account of the police visit has led to widespread support from Conservatives and online commentators, including Tory leader Kemi Badenoch.
But an Essex Police spokesperson has told Sky News its investigation was never for an NCHI, and that the matter was always being treated as an investigation into an alleged criminal offence of inciting racial hatred.
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Speaking on her Planet Normal podcast on Wednesday, Ms Pearson said she found the visit “chilling”.
“I was dumbfounded, upset, it’s not very nice,” she said. “I was in my dressing gown on the step of the house, these two coppers were there just outside the door.
“There were people gathering for the Remembrance Day parade so there were people watching from the other side of the road.
“Whatever I did or didn’t tweet, if somebody found it offensive, that to me is still not a reason for two policemen to come to my house on a Sunday morning.
“You know, they don’t do that for burglars, do they? We know policing is under-resourced and they are unable to attend often quite serious crimes.
“This was the most extraordinary overreach and state intrusion into my private life and I don’t think I did anything wrong and I think their response was outrageous.”
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In a statement, Essex Police said: “Officers attended an address in Essex and invited a woman to come to a voluntary interview.
“They said it related to an investigation into an alleged offence of inciting racial hatred, linked to a post on social media.
“For clarity: a complaint of a possible criminal offence was made to the police and this is why we called; to arrange an interview.
“Everyone was polite and professional throughout the brief conversation.”
They said an officer told Ms Pearson: “It’s gone down as an incident or offence of potentially inciting racial hatred online. That would be the offence.”
Essex Police say they have complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) over what they call “false reporting” regarding the ongoing investigation.
In an interview with The Telegraph published yesterday, Kemi Badenoch said police visiting a journalist over a social media post was “absolutely wrong” and that “we need to look at the laws around non-crime hate incidents”.
“There has been a long-running problem with people not taking free speech seriously,” she said.
She challenged the prime minister to review the laws, saying: “Keir Starmer says he is someone who believes in these things. Now he needs to actually show that he does believe it. All we’ve seen from him is the opposite.”
Ms Badenoch added: “We need to stop this behaviour of people wasting police time on trivial incidents because they don’t like something, as if they’re in a nursery.
“It’s like children reporting each other. And I think that in certain cases, the police do it because they’re afraid that if they don’t do it, they will also be accused of not taking these issues seriously.”
Essex Police said the officers went to the address to invite Ms Pearson to attend a voluntary interview as part of their investigation, which was passed to them by another force.
“The report relates to a social media post which was subsequently removed,” the statement read.
“An investigation is now being carried out under Section 17 of the Public Order Act.”
Essex Police also said they made attempts to contact Ms Pearson before the visit.
Other prominent Conservative voices such as Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Chris Philp have also leapt to Ms Pearson’s defence online, as has X owner Elon Musk, who quoted a post about the incident and said: “This needs to stop.”
Police commentator Graham Wettone told Sky News the police are “duty bound to investigate allegations of crime”.
“They’ve had an allegation of crime made there,” he said. “They will investigate it. If at the end of this they decide that no criminal offence has been committed – and we’re not at that stage yet – then it can still be recorded as a none crime hate incident.”
The police, he said, are duty bound to keep a record of none crime hate incidents.
“Parliament said they want the police to do this, to investigate and record incidents like this. So they are doing exactly what parliament and society asked them to do, and they are getting criticism for doing what people want.”
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Sir Keir Starmer vows to defend budget decisions ‘all day long’ as farmers slam ‘disrespectful’ PM
Sir Keir Starmer has said he will defend the decisions made in the budget “all day long” amid anger from farmers over inheritance tax changes.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced last month in her key speech that from April 2026, farms worth more than £1m will face an inheritance tax rate of 20%, rather than the standard 40% applied to other land and property.
The announcement has sparked anger among farmers who argue this will mean higher food prices, lower food production and having to sell off land to pay for the tax.
Sir Keir defended the budget as he gave his first speech as prime minister at the Welsh Labour conference in Llandudno, North Wales, where farmers have been holding a tractor protest outside.
Sir Keir admitted: “We’ve taken some extremely tough decisions on tax.”
He said: “I will defend facing up to the harsh light of fiscal reality. I will defend the tough decisions that were necessary to stabilise our economy.
“And I will defend protecting the payslips of working people, fixing the foundations of our economy, and investing in the future of Britain and the future of Wales. Finally, turning the page on austerity once and for all.”
He also said the budget allocation for Wales was a “record figure” – some £21bn for next year – an extra £1.7bn through the Barnett Formula, as he hailed a “path of change” with Labour governments in Wales and Westminster.
And he confirmed a £160m investment zone in Wrexham and Flintshire will be going live in 2025.
‘PM should have addressed the protesters’
Among the hundreds of farmers demonstrating was Gareth Wyn Jones, who told Sky News it was “disrespectful” that the prime minister did not mention farmers in his speech.
He said “so many people have come here to air their frustrations. He (Starmer) had an opportunity to address the crowd. Even if he was booed he should have been man enough to come out and talk to the people”.
He said farmers planned to deliver Sir Keir a letter which begins with “don’t bite the hand that feeds you”.
Farmers’ tractor protest outside the Welsh Labour conference in Llandudno, North Wales
Mr Wyn Jones told Sky News the government was “destroying” an industry that was already struggling.
“They’re destroying an industry that’s already on its knees and struggling, absolutely struggling, mentally, emotionally and physically. We need government support not more hindrance so we can produce food to feed the nation.”
He said inheritance tax changes will result in farmers increasing the price of food: “The poorer people in society aren’t going to be able to afford good, healthy, nutritious British food, so we have to push this to government for them to understand that enough is enough, the farmers can’t take any more of what they’re throwing at us.”
Mr Wyn Jones disputed the government’s estimation that only 500 farming estates in the UK will be affected by the inheritance tax changes.
“Look, a lot of farmers in this country are in their 70s and 80s, they haven’t handed their farms down because that’s the way it’s always been, they’ve always known there was never going to be inheritance tax.”
On Friday, Sir Keir addressed farmers’ concerns, saying: “I know some farmers are anxious about the inheritance tax rules that we brought in two weeks ago.
“What I would say about that is, once you add the £1m for the farmland to the £1m that is exempt for your spouse, for most couples with a farm wanting to hand on to their children, it’s £3m before anybody pays a penny in inheritance tax.”
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Welsh farmer Gareth Wyn Jones
Ministers said the move will not affect small farms and is aimed at targeting wealthy landowners who buy up farmland to avoid paying inheritance tax.
But analysis this week said a typical family farm would have to put 159% of annual profits into paying the new inheritance tax every year for a decade and could have to sell 20% of their land.
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
The Country and Land Business Association (CLA), which represents owners of rural land, property and businesses in England and Wales, found a typical 200-acre farm owned by one person with an expected profit of £27,300 would face a £435,000 inheritance tax bill.
The plan says families can spread the inheritance tax payments over 10 years, but the CLA found this would require an average farm to allocate 159% of its profits each year for a decade.
To pay that, successors could be forced to sell 20% of their land, the analysis found.
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