Gran, 63, despairs as cost of living payment ‘vanishes’ – ‘Will have to give up home’ | Personal Finance | Finance

Millions of Britons face misery and despair as energy bills rocket, and it will get worse when the energy price cap jumps to £3,549 a year from October 1. The human cost of this is slowly coming to light.

Catherine Haley waited 10 years to get her council house in Sunderland, and she loves living there.

Catherine, 63, a former printer for Sunderland council, has been unable to work since she had an operation for bowel cancer in 2008. “I’ve been really poorly ever since,” she says.

Her marriage broke up after the diagnosis, so she lives there alone. “It’s so handily placed, there’s a massive Aldi just over the road that I can walk to.”

The bungalow has a small garden with a sunny aspect, and Catherine has loved sitting there during the summer. “I’ve been taking in the rays, just like I was on holiday somewhere hot,” she says.

But there’s a cloud on the horizon, and it is threatening the life that Catherine has come to love.

Her combined gas and electricity bill recently doubled to around £120 a month, and now she reckons it could shoot past £250.

Catherine is furious with her energy company, which increased her monthly direct debit by £50 without even telling her. “The extra money just came out of my account, with no warning. How dare they?”

Energy costs will eat up a massive chunk of the two benefits she gets due to her health problems, the Employment Support Allowance and Personal Independence Payment.

These give her total income of £900 a month. As energy prices rise, the cost could soon eat up a third of the money she receives.

“Gas and electric aren’t the only things going up, every time I go to Aldi, all the prices have. It’s all you hear people talking about in the aisles.”

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A friend who owns a car drove Catherine to a local Tesco as a treat, and she couldn’t believe the prices. “No way could I afford to buy my food there,” she says.

Buying an air fryer has helped. “They’re supposed to be the cheapest way to cook. I treat myself to a £3 chicken from Aldi, and it’s lovely.”

She also batch cooks stews, curries and Bolognese, which she separates into cartons and stores in the freezer.

Catherine has received help from anti-poverty charity Fair for You, which offers affordable loans to help low-income families buy essential household items instead of using predatory doorstep lenders.

Catherine says this has helped her purchase a cut-price cooker, fridge freezer and tumble dryer. “They’ve been a huge help,” she says.

She is desperate to buy some new clothes, but it’s not easy. “I haven’t bought anything for two years.”

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Catherine was relieved when the Government announced the £650 Cost of Living Payment in June, but when the first £326 came through it just “vanished”. “I owed my energy company £400, so it went towards that.”

She is angry that the support goes straight into the coffers of “profiteering” energy companies. “It doesn’t actually benefit ordinary people,” she says.

Now fears she’ll have to move in with her daughter after the energy cap rises in October.

Daughter Leanne, 43, a single mother with 15-year-old twin boys John and Gary, works full time but is also struggling as prices rocket.

She only lives a couple of miles away but Catherine says. “I love my little bungalow, but unless the Government does something, I’ll have to give it up. I won’t have any choice.”

Conservative Party leader frontrunner Liz Truss has talked about offering tax cuts to help people, but that will do nothing for the worst off, Catherine says.

“It could end in riots like the Poll Tax unless she acts. People are not going to put up with it.”