The Reporter

The Reporter

Rising prices and falling prices added up to a double headache for ministers this week. On Tuesday it emerged that surging food and energy bills helped push up the UK's inflation rate to 3% last month - the sharpest increase in the cost of living in almost six years. That prompted Lib Dem shadow chancellor Vince Cable to claim that "the wheels are starting to come off the British economy". A few hours later, the government unwittingly disclosed its grim forecast for the property market when housing minister Caroline Flint was photographed clutching a briefing paper stating that, "at best", prices will tumble by 5%-10% this year. Close inspection revealed that her document also said: "We can't know how bad it will get."

A mini problem

Spare a thought for all the personal finance experts bowled a googly by the government's surprise £2.7bn package of tax cuts aimed at defusing the 10p tax band row. Commentators say the changes amount to an emergency mini-budget - which means all those recently published 2008/09 tax handbooks and tax table mouse mats have been left looking rather redundant.

Virgin territory

During the last year, more than 2.5 million credit card customers have been hit with an annual or monthly fee, been told their credit limit is being cut, or had their account shut down. So says uSwitch.com which issued research showing that card.....continued below

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All for one

Single mums are better at teaching their children about the value of money than dual parent families, according to new research. Over two-thirds of all single mothers say they include their kids in the day-to-day running of the household finances, and nearly half of those say this is because they want their offspring to know why they may not be able to afford toys or luxuries. "At a time when the government is trying to boost financial education and literacy in schools, it is single mums who could be their biggest allies," say the lovely people at retailer BrightHouse Stores, which commissioned the research.

Football fans go for broke

More than 40,000 British fans plan to make the journey to Moscow to see Manchester United and Chelsea battle it out in the Champions League final on Wednesday. But expensive flights and high accommodation costs mean the total bill for watching Cristiano Ronaldo and the rest go through their paces could well run into thousands. A meal for two in Moscow is likely to set you back the equivalent of around £19, while a bottle of beer will cost around £2.25, says International Currency Exchange. And it warns fans they are only allowed to take in 50,000 rubles (equivalent to about £1,100) and that foreign currency in and out of Russia is permitted up to $10,000 or equivalent, with anything over $3,000 needing to be declared.

If your holiday went down the pan ...