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TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber has voiced his concerns about the latest inflation figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which show that Retail Price Index (RPI) inflation increased to 5.6 per cent and Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation increased to 5.2 per cent in September.
He said: “The cost of living is now rising three times faster than wages – squeezing people’s living standards even tighter. But instead of standing up for hard-pressed families, the Government is making things worse by hiking VAT and cutting vital tax credits. Ministers must do all they can to promote a plan B based on jobs and decent wages. We cannot build a sustainable economic recovery on the back of people getting poorer.
“These figures also confirm that the Government’s CPI stealth cut will reduce the value of benefits and pensions by 0.4 per cent next year. This cut could slash public sector pensions, as well as many in the private sector, by nearly 30 per cent over the next three decades, and send many more people into poverty in retirement.”
