Things that make you go .....Hmmm, that's interesting.

[johnnycool]

Maybe they have to pay a deposit to keep it over the summer for the following academic year.

i think this crowd, Prestige Living I think they're called are pulling a fast one on Belfast City Council.

The wee lads agreement is from Sept to the end of June, so they know full well they'd be empty over the summer months and then use the accommodation like a hostel or Air BnB where they can rent by the night and get much more.

[LC]

My oldest possibly heading for the city in a couple of years time.

These student blocks are not cheap but from what I hear the Holylands is not the place it used to be, Stranmillis might be a safer bet.

[Ethan Tremblay]

You would imagine the rent in the Holylands/Stanmillis would be around half what is being paid in these new city centre accommodation blocks.  Bar international students, I wouldn't have thought too many would have been moving into them. 

I found the Botanic area of Belfast, which leads into the Holylands, rough the last time I walked through it.  I wouldn't feel safe around there, but there would be safety in numbers I suppose.   

[imtommygunn]

Botanic avenue area is a shithole.

I dunno what rent is paid in holylands these days but I have heard it's dear enough. I imagine you're 500 plus a month anyway.

[seafoid]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/02/23/meet-the-middle-class-poor/

I was surprised how was I able to relate to so many parts of this article.

Me and her, on paper, have good salaries but still not a pile, if anything, left at the end of the month.  That is even with only 1 car payment plus thankfully we are now beyond creche and student loans.

Shook off child care with Covid, but now at the other end with Student loans...

It never ends, does it?

Give us the gist of that report as I'm too skint to read it?

It never stops no matter what you say or do, my daughters lived away from home during college, rent paid by us, one had a job through college, the other, well wouldn't call match day At Liverpool a real wage, so she costs the most..

Add in flights to come home, and back, I do offer the boat as a cheaper version but gets knocked back, plus she didn't like a course, now doing another one so adding on an extra year or rent, great!

Then when they get older it will be more money no doubt, helping them get a deposit for a house, feck me you are better off disowning them all and head to the hills!!

The debt they have for going to college is insane, but they don't see it, would never encourage college unless its actually a practical degree, that you'll actually use and the employer helps with it! 

We've cut back on holidays and stopped employing a cleaner': Meet the 'middle-class poor'
The cost of living crisis is redefining what it means to be middle class in the UK – and stripping luxuries once taken for granted


1514

Gift this article free
Andy Coley
Andy Coley: 'We've switched to shopping in places like Aldi and B&M'
Flic Everett
23 February 2025 10:00am GMT
Flic Everett
'Middle class' used to be shorthand for a certain lifestyle. Holidays once or twice a year, perhaps a fortnight in Tuscany and skiing in France at half term. Eating out regularly, and an Ocado van parked outside the house, sagging with hummus and sourdough. Homeware from John Lewis, weekend dinner parties with 'good' wine... all the trappings for which we mocked ourselves but still thoroughly enjoyed. Then there were the solid pensions, the secure savings, the family property on a leafy street near good, perhaps even private, schools. As members of the middle classes, it all seemed within reach. Now, however, not so much.

The cost of living crisis saw energy bills shoot up 54 per cent in April 2022, then a further 27 per cent in October that year – and they still hover far above pre-crisis levels. Meanwhile, the Food Foundation reveals the average food basket cost has risen by 27.3 per cent since 2022. UK housing now costs 44 per cent more than it does in the 38 member countries of the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development), with lucky Dutch families a huge 39 per cent better off than we are.

The Office of National Statistics defines a middle-class salary as between around £30,000 and £60,000. Yet the Financial Fairness Trust (FFT) recently found that around 20 per cent are "struggling to afford food and essentials", while many others are using savings to live on or accruing debt. Policy adviser at the FFT, Donald Hirsh, said: "(It's affecting) people who you would expect to be doing OK. Being on a middle income does not make people secure in the current cost of living crisis."

Author of Leadership is a Skill, and leadership development trainer, Andy Coley, 48, lives in London. He is married with three children and says: "We've cut back on holiday plans, even UK trips, and we've switched to shopping in places like Aldi and B&M. We've also stopped employing a cleaner and taking the bedding to the laundrette. Now, we do endless loads of washing instead."

Andy Coley
Author Andy Coley and his family will consider moving out of London if living costs continue to rise Credit: Julian Simmonds
School uniforms are bought on Vinted, he adds, and rather than fork out for kids' clubs in the holidays, "we now can't work simultaneously. Instead, we've been juggling it between us."

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Coley notes that "lots of our friends are also having to economise, particularly those who are self-employed. If things don't improve, we'll have to think seriously about moving out of London."

It's not just the self-employed struggling, either. Many previously iron-clad middle-class careers, including those in the media and hospitality, are shedding jobs like autumn leaves. The number of employees in the UK dropped by 47,000 in December, and job-search site Indeed reported overall postings are down 14 per cent since early 2020.

Doctors and teachers are quitting in droves, largely due to stress. More than 40 per cent of GPs see themselves leaving the profession in the next five years, according to the Royal College of General Practioners, while figures from the Department of Education show almost 9 per cent of teachers dropped out of schools in 2022. Elsewhere, university leavers, who were once guaranteed good jobs, are struggling to even get a toe on the career ladder.

I'm not issuing invitations to the world's tiniest violin recital here, but it's clear that having what used to be considered a decent career is now nowhere near enough to enjoy the perks it once bestowed.

Katie Mitchell runs a baby photography business and lives in Gloucester with her Army officer husband and their seven-year-old son. "Previously we were both in the Army and commanded a good wage. Then we had our son and I became self-employed," she explains. "I was starting to grow the business, then our mortgage almost doubled in January last year and it's been a struggle ever since."

Katie Mitchell
Together with her Army officer husband, photographer Katie Mitchell earns more than £100,000 a year – yet holidays are a thing of the past Credit: Matt Writtle
Bills have gone up, too, she adds. "We were spending over £300 a month. I went through a phase of trying to stop heating the house unnecessarily and it was just miserable." Now, Mitchell works long hours. "I love growing the business, but every time it reaches a milestone, the bills go up, so I never feel I'm getting anywhere." She adds: "We live on our overdraft a lot more than we used to, which is something we never would have done in the past. We've accrued debts with surprise payments, too – for instance, our roof needed fixing."

Mitchell has also switched her vehicle to electric to save on fuel, and committed to a 'no-spend January'. "Normally, we'd grab a treat from the shop after school or I'd go to a coffee shop to work. Now I buy treats at the supermarket rather than on impulse. I cook at home a lot more, whereas in the past we might have gone to eat at the pub or got fish and chips." And while she's clinging to her gym membership, "I'd no longer pay for a massage or a spa day with friends. I go on boring walks instead."

Like many of us, Mitchell misses holidays the most. "We need to prioritise paying off the debts first. Once, we would have gone skiing every year or somewhere warm in summer, but that's not happening."

Middle-class cutting back has quietly become standard, she adds. "People have said to me, 'I didn't realise you were struggling too'. But we're earning over £100k between us – how can you not live easily on that? It seems ridiculous."

'Our mortgage almost doubled in January last year and it's been a struggle ever since'
'Our mortgage almost doubled in January last year and it's been a struggle ever since' Credit: Matt Writtle
She's not wrong. I too am one of a growing number of people who might be called "middle-class poor". In my case, we haven't had a holiday since 2019 (an off-season week in Spain) and I never buy new books – once my greatest joy. Instead, I hang around BorrowBox, the online library, waiting to see if anyone's returned the latest Lisa Jewell. Ditto clothes – I've always enjoyed a bargain, but the £1 rail at the local community shop is now my go-to. And rather than shop at the lovely local deli, where I used to buy Teapigs (£10.95 for 50 bags, yes, I know), I've secretly begun to frequent Farmfoods for bulk buys of Yorkshire Tea.

Thankfully, Ocado and M&S – food-shopping temples for the middle class – seem to grasp the problem. Despite post-budget worries, Ocado CEO Hannah Gibson has promised that the beloved grocer is "very focussed on the value that we offer... there will be additional costs and we'll continue to work to make sure we're mitigating that so we can protect our consumers." M&S CEO Stuart Machin has also said the store aims to shield customers from rising prices.

But even if we can still pick up a Honduran prawn sandwich at lunchtime, that won't change school fees, childcare costs and household bills.

"I see first-hand how rising costs are making life tougher, even for those who wouldn't usually consider themselves struggling," says Louisa Willcox, a South West-based 'Profit Mentor' who helps businesses manage their money. "I live with my husband and two children, and, despite running a successful business, we've had to adjust our spending."

Things like clothes shopping, home improvements and spontaneous treats have all been scaled back. "When everything from the food shop to the gas bill is going up, something has to give," she says. "You go to the supermarket and spend £50 on what used to cost £30. A family day out now feels like a luxury instead of a normal treat. It's frustrating and so many people are trying to figure out where they can cut back without feeling like they're missing out too much."

And while some middle-class midlifers have savings and hefty pension pots to rely on, others, like me, do not. I've been a self-employed writer and novelist for 30 years, and was very much of the 'grasshopper' mentality when it came to money; 'You never know when you'll be paid, so buy those shoes while you can' was my approach. Two large Victorian houses slipped through my fingers, the profits from which dwindled to nothing post-divorce. Now, [even] though my husband and I live in a small cottage in rural Scotland, the cost of gas and electricity is, quarterly, more than my parents paid for the house I grew up in.

I know, of course, that compared to millions I'm still enormously lucky and any future pension penury is entirely my own fault. But I am wondering what will become of the pleasures that for decades, the middle-class backbone of Britain has taken for granted. Trips to restaurants, good food and wine, a choice of schools, sunny holidays, decent-size homes on reasonably pleasant streets... increasingly, those things are out of reach, and we're working not for enjoyable extras, but to keep the roof over our heads. We're cutting corners, failing to save, buying less treats, using fewer services – all of which has a giant knock-on effect on the economy. Could this crisis mean the end of the middle classes as we know them or are we just biding our time until we have enough saved to make a triumphant return to John Lewis?

"I can't see things getting any easier or cheaper for at least five years," admits Coley. "It's taken a long time to get this terrible and it'll take a while to bring down costs, improve people's earnings – and get people feeling happier about spending money again."

[Windmill abu]

https://www.irishnews.com/entertainment/the-night-bernadette-devlin-had-dinner-with-muhammad-ali-before-his-1972-croke-park-fight-KB2N5XL2UREDZJGOXTUG3W6P2E/

I'm not sure if I have copied the link properly. But the story of Bernadette McAliskey having dinner with Muhammad Ali certainly qualify as interesting.

[LC]

Definitely would agree with below, things getting very expensive in this regard compared to previous years.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/news/british-middle-class-priced-out-of-european-holidays/

Rising taxes, persistently high mortgage rates, eye-watering energy costs and the shock of inflation are all taking their toll on our spending power. Meanwhile, the cost of flights and foreign holidays continues to rise, especially during the school holidays. A return air fare to Corfu can now cost over £1,300, and a recent report by Which? found that package holiday prices in 2025 for seven out of ten popular destinations have risen above the overall UK rate of inflation since last year.

Price increases in traditional middle-class favourites – notably Italy, Portugal and Cyprus – have been the steepest of all. According to the consumer organisation, the average cost of a seven-night package holiday, including flights, in the first week of August with a major tour operator in Italy in particular has shot up by 7.4 per cent – nearly three times the rate of inflation.

It's a double whammy of tightening purse strings and rising prices, yet counter-intuitively, a survey by YouGov last November, suggested that, despite these challenges, the number of British people taking overseas holidays had actually edged up between 2023 and 2024. So what is going on? Are we prioritising our holidays at the expense of making other savings elsewhere, or are the country's economic woes a mirage?

In fact, this slight rise in bookings masks a different, demographic trend. Younger people (principally those aged 18 to 34) are taking significantly more holidays than before, while families and older holidaymakers are travelling less – most of them citing the rising cost of living and affordability issues as the reason behind the cutbacks.

Stitched panorama of the sandstone cliffs in Gale beach, Comporta , Portugal
Price increases in traditional middle-class favourites such as Portugal have been the steepest of all Credit: Alamy
It feels like further confirmation of a recent Telegraph report which identified a new category of economic stress emerging in Britain: the middle-class "poor". These are people on "middle-class" salaries (defined by the ONS as roughly £30,000-£60,000 per year) who are no longer able to afford the lifestyle they had come to expect. According to the Financial Fairness Trust (FFT), around 20 per cent of this contingent is "struggling to afford food and essentials", while many others are using up savings or accruing debt. Holidays are certainly falling down the list of priorities.

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Interestingly, the impact of this squeeze on holiday spending power among the middle classes isn't just about travelling less. It affects where people stay and when they choose to go away. There is growing evidence that British travellers on restricted budgets are being pushed into off-season holidays – very off-season, in fact. I reported on this trend for bookings to long-haul destinations last year, and it seems to be true for short breaks to Europe too.

Kirker Travel says that bookings for key destinations in Italy between January and March this year were up 30-40 per cent. And in Venice last January, several smaller good-value hotels, popular with discerning British tourists, told me that they were now fully-booked right through the winter months. Meanwhile their larger, more expensive rivals were either closed until the carnival season, or were offering discounts, suggesting that they were struggling to sell their rooms.

This retreat into cheaper accommodation and off-season booking is surely an effect of the growing pressure on major destinations in Europe. Come the spring, we British have to compete not only with our European neighbours, but with the resurgence of tourists from Asia and Australasia, and particularly with the growing numbers from America. The numbers heading to Europe from the US soared by 30 per cent between 2022 and 2023 (the last year for which figures are available) to over 20 million, that's seven million more than the number of Europeans who went to the US.

Grand canal on sunny day in Venice, Italy
In Venice last January, several smaller good-value hotels told me that they were now fully-booked right through the winter months Credit: iStockphoto
They have huge spending power. The average salary after tax in the US is 40 per cent more than it is here in the UK (£40,000, compared with about £28,450). And those Americans who choose to holiday abroad are much richer than average. In 2023, the average household income for Americans who holidayed overseas was $154,000 (£120,000).

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Not only do Americans have much more cash, they have been enjoying a stronger dollar, meaning prices in Europe look even lower to them. The US currency reached parity with the Euro in late January, and though it has fallen back a little since then, it is still ten per cent higher than it was at the end of 2020.

Not surprisingly then, there are clear signs of Americans moving onto our traditional holiday turf, especially at the top-end of the market. Luxury villa special Simpson Travel, for example, says that bookings from the US are growing – it now has a dedicated American website with dollar pricing and a local American phone number. Another upmarket villa company, Scott Williams, also says that it has seen an increase in enquiries from across the Atlantic so far this year. And UK-based cultural tours specialist, Martin Randall – most of whose tours are in continental Europe – says it has seen a year-on-year increase of 8 per cent in bookings from the US (as well as a stunning surge of 39 per cent from Australia and New Zealand).

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Meanwhile, the cost of a stay in one of Europe's classic grand hotels has become distorted out of all proportion. I remember, in the 1990s when on a very modest salary, booking a night in a River Room suite at the Savoy Hotel in London. I paid around £150 – certainly expensive, but just about affordable as a special treat (in this case it was my wedding night). Today, the same room costs nearly £3,000. I am much better off now than I was then, but I would never dream of forking out that much – even for a second honeymoon.

Broadly speaking, even a relatively modest room at one of the top hotels in London, Paris, New York, Venice or Rome now often costs £1,000 a night. Standards have gone up, but room rates have rocketed disproportionately. This isn't just because of American money of course – these hotels are the top choice of the super rich from all over the world, from the Middle East to China and Brazil.

In Britain, from a travelling point of view, we have had it good for decades. But slowly and surely, it seems, we – and especially those of us in the squeezed middle – are being edged towards the margins of the travelling world.

[LC]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/creqz7gn3e1o

Talk about throwing money down the drain.

The Airport in Derry clearly not able to wipe its face yet Council and Stormount seem to take turns in writing the cheques.

[JoG2]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/creqz7gn3e1o

Talk about throwing money down the drain.

The Airport in Derry clearly not able to wipe its face yet Council and Stormount seem to take turns in writing the cheques.

Great news, so so handy

[DrinkingHarp]

The future looks so interesting....

https://futurism.com/the-byte/kawasaki-rideable-horse-robot

Could see these used for rescue, farming, adventure and military

[johnnycool]

first all girl space flight is ready to launch.

The vessel in question is very interesting...