UK inflation rates reach double digits

The latest inflation figures show the cost of living has increased by 10.1% in the 12 months leading up to September.

The increase is driven mostly by the rising food prices that have skyrocketed at the fastest rate in 40 years, reports from The Office for National Statistics (ONS) show. The figure was last higher in 1982.

In an address in the House of Commons, the prime minister told MPs that she and the chancellor remain “completely committed” to raising pensions with inflation. 

Samuel Tombs, chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, told the Financial Times: “MPC still is a long way from being able to claim victory” over inflation. 

At the Financial Times’s Energy Transition Summit, John Pettigrew, the head of the National Grid, spoke out about potential blackouts the UK could face in the winter months.

Mr Pettigrew said that the company would have to impose rolling power cuts on the “deepest darkest evenings in January and February” if generators failed to secure enough gas to meet demand, particularly if the country suffers a cold snap.

Today, the National Grid, which oversees Britain’s electricity and gas systems, has announced the development of new technology on its electricity transmission network that could expand the capacity of its existing overhead power lines.

By increasing capacity and allowing more renewable power to flow, this technology could also reduce constraint payments (where the electricity system operator pays generators to stop producing power to avoid overloading the transmission system) – with this trial potentially saving £1.4 million in constraint costs a year.

Hudson Gilmer, CEO of LineVision, said: “If we are to meet ambitious climate targets by 2030, we need to essentially double the size of our grid.