Cost of living crisis: Peterborough's Labour leader warns of impact on city's poorest households of rising inflation

The Labour group leader on Peterborough City Council says he fears record inflation levels will fuel a growth in the number impoverished households across the city.

Councillor Shaz Nawaz says help is urgently needed from the Government to stop the slide to worsening deprivation for many residents as inflation hit a 40 year high of 10.1 per cent in September with the price of food and non-alcoholic drinks thought to have risen by as much as 14.6 per cent.

His comments were prompted by new figures from the Office for National Statistics that show 55 per cent of households in Peterborough are living under at least one measure of deprivation.

The ONS says that of the 277,600 households in the city, 55 per cent - 152,680 - are living with a ‘dimension’ of deprivation as measured by the Census 2021, which has highlighted five city neighbourhoods that are regarded as the most ‘deprived’ in the city.

Of the four measures of deprivation, the first is where any member of a household, who is not a full-time student, is either unemployed or long-term sick, and the second covers households where no person has at least five or more GCSE passes or equivalent qualifications, and no 16 to 18-year-olds are full-time students.

The third is where any person has general health that is “bad” or “very bad” or has a long-term health problem, and the fourth where the household’s accommodation is overcrowded or is in a shared dwelling, or has no central heating.

Cllr Nawaz said: "The ONS shows that 55 per cent of Peterborough households are living in deprivation. This figure will get worse over the next 12 months due to the impact of inflation.

"The government needs to step-in urgently and start offering support that is fit for purpose.

"If they don’t then we may end up with a huge crisis that will cause all sorts of pain for people.

"The problem we have is that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is out of touch with people.

"He has little -to-no understanding of the daily struggles of ordinary folk.

"We need a government that is proactive and puts the people of this country first.”