The cost of remoteness: Reflecting higher living costs in remote rural Scotland when measuring fuel poverty - 2024 update

4 Results

The previous section has set out the key changes in urban UK MIS budgets in 2024, as well as capturing how these have been included in this update of minimum budgets for remote rural Scotland. This section sets out what this means for minimum budgets and, crucially, what this means for the uplifts that should be applied in the calculation of fuel poverty in 2024.

Households with children

The uplifts for households with children, shown in Table 1, have fallen between 2023 and 2024, both for remote mainland and remote island areas. For remote mainland areas, the uplift figure is 8% in 2024 compared with 14% in 2023; for islands it is 10% in 2024 compared with 14% in 2023. This reduction in the overall uplift in both mainland and island areas is the result of changes in a small number of budget areas – principally food, motoring, and social and cultural participation.

As noted above, minimum food baskets for urban UK have changed in composition in 2024 and these have been re-priced in mainland and island areas, following the patterns of shopping agreed by groups in 2021. The re-pricing of food baskets in 2024 shows that the premium resulting from buying food from smaller shops is not as large as in previous years, and consequently the difference in cost between urban UK and remote rural Scotland has fallen.

The cost of motoring in remote rural Scotland remains substantially higher than the cost of motoring in urban UK. This is a result of the higher cost of purchasing a car, the higher cost of fuel and the significantly higher mileage required in remote areas compared to urban UK. However, in re-pricing the motoring budget in 2024, rather than uprating previous budget amounts by inflation, the difference between urban UK and remote rural areas has reduced. This is likely to be a consequence of, for example, a gap between the real change in the cost of buying a car in remote rural Scotland over time and the changes captured and presented through the Consumer Prices Index.

The amount included for social and cultural participation has increased substantially between 2023 and 2024, driven by an increase in the budget included for organised activities for school-aged children, reflecting higher prices, as well as significant increases in the cost of a self-catering holiday in the UK. While remote rural budgets, for both mainland and island locations, include additional amounts to cover the cost of extra nights on route and returning from a week-long holiday, the actual cost of the holiday – 7 nights self-catering, in a caravan at the Haven holiday park at Craig Tara – is lower than the equivalent included in urban UK budgets (7 nights self-catering, in a caravan at Haven Skegness). In mainland locations, this more than off-sets the additional amounts included to cover the extra accommodation and travel; in island locations, the ‘cheaper’ annual holiday does not have the same effect.

Table 1 Comparison of weekly budgets for UK and remote rural Scotland, 2022 and 2023, couple with two children

Working-age households without children

For working-age households without children, the budget uplifts have also fallen, as shown in Table 2. For single working-age adults in remote mainland areas, the uplift is 22% in 2024, compared to 26% in 2023; for islands, the uplift is 25% compared to 29% in 2023. For working-age couples, in remote mainland areas the uplift figure in 2024 is 22% compared with 27% in 2022; in island areas, the uplift is 27% compared to 31% in 2024.

Unlike for households with children, this reduction in the uplift is not the consequence of changes in a small number of budget areas, but rather across budget areas, and changes have not all been in one direction. For example, in the report for 2022 (Bryan et al, 2024), the decision was made to ‘mirror’ changes in urban UK where these set out higher amounts than in remote rural Scotland, in specific areas of the budget, such as social and cultural participation. The ‘rebasing’ of urban UK MIS in 2024 for single and partnered working-age adults without children resulted in a reduction in the weekly amount included for social and cultural participation. In this case, selectively re-pricing the key elements of difference in remote rural Scotland, for example in relation to holidays, results in a higher amount for this budget area than in urban UK. In other cases, the amount required in remote rural Scotland is lower than in urban UK, for example, personal goods and services in mainland locations, where free prescriptions reduce the amount needed, even after re-pricing items in this budget in different retailers and despite the inclusion of the £200 a year per adult to access health-related services.

Table 2 Comparison of weekly budgets for UK and remote rural Scotland, 2022 and 2023, working-age, no children

Pensioner households

In contrast to working-age households, the pattern for pensioner households is different, as shown in Table 3: the uplifts for these households in both mainland and island locations have increased between 2023 and 2024. For single pensioners in remote mainland areas, the uplift is 33% in 2024, compared with 28% in 2023; for islands, the uplift figure is 32% in 2024, compared with 25% in 2023. For pensioner couples, the uplift figure in mainland areas in 2024 is 21%, compared with 18% in 2023; for islands, the uplift is 29% in 2024, and was 23% in 2023. As for working-age adults without children, the change in uplift is not being driven clearly by one area of a minimum budget, although differences in the price of food, motoring and holidays between urban UK and remote rural Scotland all contribute to the increase in the uplift.

Table 3 Comparison of weekly budgets for UK and remote rural Scotland, 2022 and 2023, pensioner

In summary, Table 4 gives the uplifts by household type that should be applied in the calculation of fuel poverty in 2024.