Callum Mason

Journalist working at i. Formerly of MoneySavingExpert.com and Tes.

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Reeves warned more borrowing risks driving up mortgage rates

Moves to loosen rules that limit the amount of money the Government can borrow at next month’s Budget risk interest rates staying higher for longer and banks hitting the brakes on recent mortgage rate cuts, the Chancellor has been warned.Rachel Reeves is considering changes to her fiscal rules – rules that govern how much she can spend and borrow – at October’s Budget.In its manifesto earlier this year, Labour said it would follow a rule that debt must be falling as a share of the economy by the...
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'Optimistic' mortgage rates could end up having to rise again, economists warn

Mortgage rates could end up ticking back up in the future, economists have warned, claiming they are currently based on “optimistic” forecasts of the speed at which the Bank of England will cut interest rates.Earlier this year, mortgage rates fell below 4 per cent on expectations that the Bank would cut interest rates in the first half of the year, but when it became clear that this would not happen, the price of home loans rose.Economists warn this could happen again.This is because fixed mortg...
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Reeves's '£10bn windfall' explained - and why it won't reverse winter fuel cut

A decision by the Bank of England could give Rachel Reeves an extra £10bn of “headroom” at her upcoming Budget, according to reports.This is a term used to describe the buffer zone the Government has while still meeting the Budget rules it sets for itself.Some have called upon Reeves, if she does have this extra windfall, to reverse the controversial decision to cut the winter fuel allowance for many pensioners.But does the Bank’s decision actually give Reeves more space – and could that be used...
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700k graduates locked out of housing market by £2k extra tax

More than 700,000 former university students are now paying back £2,000 or more a year towards their student loan – a figure that has nearly doubled in the past five years and is preventing graduates from getting on to the property ladder.Many now pay greater portions of their salaries each month to the Government as a result of retrospective changes to student loan rules, according to a Freedom of Information request made by i to the Student Loans Company.Most students face making these large r...
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'Never spend over 30% of income on rent': the golden rule that became impossible

A commonly used rule that households should not spend more than 30 per cent of their income on rent has become “impossible” to follow for people in many regions of Britain, analysis for i shows.The Office for National Statistics (ONS) uses the 30 per cent barometer – which it calculates from pre-tax income – as a proxy for whether a home is affordable, but analysis from Savills estate agency suggests that an average household will be spending more than this in around 60 per cent of parliamentary...
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Economists criticise Sunak's 'utterly irresponsible' interest rates claim

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has been criticised by former Bank of England economists for “utterly irresponsible” and “nonsense” comments suggesting a vote for the Conservatives at the general election is a vote to cut interest rates.

In an interview with The Times, the Prime Minister was asked if a vote the Tories was a vote for lower interest rates, and said: “Of course it is, because we are the party who has committed to bringing down inflation, which is a necessary condition for bringing down
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Labour NHS backlog plan at risk of ‘staff exodus’ without urgent pension clarity

Labour has been warned of an NHS staff “exodus” this summer unless it urgently sets out how its plans to reinstate tax on large pension pots will work.

The party has committed to reintroducing the lifetime allowance cap on pensions – a limit on the amount people can build in pension savings over their lifetime and still receive tax relief – having criticised the Government for removing it.

Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves pledged to reinstate the limit, but said the party would allow a work-aro
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Triple lock plus would only save many OAPs £14.60 a year by 2028, analysis shows

Retirees relying on the full new state pension as their sole income could end up saving just £14.60 per year – or 28p a week – in tax payments by 2028 through the Conservative Party’s triple lock plus policy, according to calculations for .

Rishi Sunak has outlined plans to increase the tax-free allowance for pensioners in line with the existing “triple lock” to ensure it rises each year.

It would mean both the state pension and retirees’ tax-free allowance – currently £12,570 – would increase
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Why climbing the property ladder is now confined to the wealthy

Climbing the property ladder is becoming “confined to affluent households”, analysis for shows, as the number of home sales coming from existing mortgage holders buying new properties has fallen to the lowest level in at least two decades.

The term ‘property ladder’ is widely used in the UK to refer to a household’s lifetime journey through different homes as their income and financial circumstances improve, but research by a leading estate agency suggests the phrase may no longer be applicable
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Why I’m fighting for a law that means businesses have to take cash payments

Martin Quinn remembers the exact moment he started seriously wanting to campaign for cash users.

He was sitting in a branch of a high street coffee shop chain with his children, two and a half years ago, and there was a group of disabled people and their carers sat at their tables ready to get their drinks.

Some of the carers were lined up in the queue with cash, but when they got to the front and tried to pay, they were told they could not use it. They turned around, let the group know, and l
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Warning to 200,000 NHS staff that are missing out on pension payments

Hundreds of thousands of NHS workers in their fifties and sixties could be missing out on collecting pension payments as they may be unaware about a rule change to their pension scheme, retirement experts have warned.

A total of 143,632 over-60s and 65,291 over-55s, who are members of the old NHS pension scheme, have not started claiming their pension benefits despite passing what’s known as their “normal pension age”.

This is the age at which they would usually be able to start claiming their
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Boomers like me hit the financial jackpot - here's how to level the playing field

Angus Hanton believes he and his contemporaries “hit the financial jackpot,” and that’s why the self-confessed baby boomer is fighting to level the playing field for the young.

Back in 2011, the 64-year-old economist helped to set up the Intergenerational Foundation (IF), a charity and think-tank – or “think and do tank” in the words of his fellow co-founder Liz Emerson – to help protect and fight for the interests of future generations.

“Let’s go chronologically,” he says, drawing up a timeli
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Private school teachers offered £2,000 to ditch gold-plated pensions

Private schools are offering payments or increased salaries to teaching staff in return for them agreeing to pull out of their gold-plated pension schemes.

Hundreds of independent schools have already withdrawn from the Teachers Pension Scheme (TPS) and enrolled staff in alternative schemes because of the increased cost to employers.

Further schools are now enticing staff to leave the scheme with cash offers of around £2,000 in some cases, though union leaders have said these are “irresponsibl
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Thanks Avanti - your delays mean I never pay for trains anymore

Avanti West Coast gets a lot of stick, but you won’t catch me saying a bad word about it.

The beleaguered train operator – which runs the main train line between London and Glasgow – is cancelling around 26 trains a day, and there are calls for it to be stripped of the franchise.

I won’t be joining these calls. In fact, I’d go further. I’m actively opposed to them.

Why? The answer is simple, and honestly quite selfish. I don’t want to actually start having to pay for my train travel.

The Ava
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The great un-resignation: Why under-65s are coming out of early retirement

A spike in under-65s retiring during the Covid pandemic has reversed, with large numbers now returning to the workplace.

From late 2020, a peak of around 1.2 million people defined themselves as retired, Aviva analysis of Office for National Statistics (ONS) numbers released earlier this month shows.

This is despite the fact they were younger than what was previously known as the “default retirement age” – the age at which workers could be forced to retire by their employer – a rule that was c
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Top doctors and nurses prevented from staying in NHS amid pension confusion

Experienced medical staff are leaving the NHS because health trusts are failing to follow rules designed to retain them, experts have warned.

New rules were brought in last October to allow experienced NHS staff over the age of 55 to take a combination of monthly pension income and an initial tax-free lump sum from their pension pot while still working.

It was part of moves by ministers to tackle staff shortages in the NHS – but many medics seeking to stay now face a postcode lottery.

The rul
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Labour may protect headteachers' pensions from cap after warnings of exodus

Labour is considering protecting “crucial” public workers when it reinstates a tax on large pension pots amid warnings that the policy could trigger an “exodus” of headteachers.

The party has committed to reintroducing the lifetime allowance cap on pensions – a limit on the amount people can build up in pension savings over their lifetime and still receive tax relief – having criticised the Government for removing it last year.

Rishi Sunak’s Government decided to scrap the cap in an attempt to
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Student loan loophole forces 20,000 people to repay money while still studying

The Government has been urged to change a rule which forces over 20,000 part-time students each year to start repaying their student loans while they are still at university.

Industry experts have said the rules are “nonsensical” and suggested the Government should look at changing them.

Most people who take out student loans do not have to start repaying them until at least the April after they graduate.

But a clause in government regulations means that many part-time students have to start
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Why we could face 'deflation' according to some economists - and what it means

The UK could see inflation fall below its target level of two per cent this year – or even experience ‘deflation’ – two economists have claimed.

Julian Jessop, an independent economist who is a fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs think-tank, thinks there’s a significant possibility that inflation will go sub-zero, something that seemed incredibly unlikely a year ago when it sat in double digits.

He told there is now a “good chance” of deflation happening, or at least, a prolonged perio
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Now is the worst time to be a first-time buyer since 1980s

Now is the worst time for first-time buyers since at least the 1980s, analysis for has shown.

New data that looks at both how big a deposit first-time buyers now need, combined with how much of their salary mortgage payments take up, reveal there has never been a less affordable time to buy. This is according to research produced by leading estate agency Savills, which goes back to the 1980s.

In recent years the amount you need as a deposit has grown as house prices have ballooned, however thi
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I watch the pennies more but don't regret it: The people taking 50% pay cuts

Matthew Booker was in his mid-forties when he left his job in TV journalism to start training as a secondary school teacher – halving his salary in the process.

Mr Booker, who now teaches history and politics in London, was earning around £55,000 but starting his first rung in his new career meant his annual pay initially went to £26,000.

“I wasn’t earning mega bucks, but it was a comfortable salary I was on. I had a mortgage, two children – both of school age – and while it would have been al
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Over half a million to avoid worst of mortgage pain as rates set to fall

More than half a million households who took out five-year fixed deals in 2021 are set to avoid the worst of the mortgage misery that has hit much of the country.

Some 546,700 people took out five-year mortgages back in 2021, before the Bank of England started its cycle of rapid rate rises, data from the banking trade association UK Finance shows. The average rate for this cohort has remained at 2 per cent.

In the past few months it has been suggested that the official rate of interest will be
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No social life but homeowner at 22: Meet the 'never renters'

Cait Naven was determined to never rent.

“The prices are just as high as a mortgage and you’re left with nothing at the end of it,” says the 26-year-old, who bought her first home in 2020 with her boyfriend at the age of 22.

Ms Naven, who works in PR, lived at home while studying at the University of Salford, and for a year afterwards, saving around £10,000 during that time to put towards a house deposit.

“I feel really lucky. If we had rented we could never have afforded a house similar to t
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What life is like in Argentina with 160% inflation

When Francisco Soldati goes to his local market, he usually has to ask what the prices are. Because the prices change so much sellers don’t bother with price tags.

“If not, they would be changing the price every week,” he said. “Just imagine how much work that would be for the guy who changes the prices,” he says.

The 52-year-old lives in Buenos Aires, the capital city of Argentina.

In the UK, many of us panicked when inflation touched double-digits last year, but the inflation rate in South
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