Families on £44k can afford energy

Sir, – Although we are not at war, the fallout from Vladimir Putin’s folly in invading Ukraine is reverberating throughout the free world with the cost of energy likely to remain high for many years.

With this in mind and much as I enjoy the opinions of David Knight it is disappointing he has joined the harbingers of doom (Opinion, September 5) where he predicts many apart from low earners will be wiped out by the energy crisis.

There will always be exceptions but the idea that households earning as much as £44,000 per annum would be sucked into financial disaster is ludicrous.

Their lifestyle will change with money that could have gone towards a holiday in the sun or as a deposit on a new car being spent on energy bills. But to call such changes a disaster is adding a dozen eggs to the pudding.

Being midway through my eighth decade with remaining hair most definitely silver, I belong to the group Mr Knight refers to as maintaining a modest lifestyle from a state and small private (substitute NHS) pension after decades (retired at 72) of hard work and paying taxes. The benefit of this simple way of life is I have no need to put out the begging bowl for government help to meet the cost of energy.

I hope Mr Knight is not one of those wobbling along a path adjacent to the gutter.

But if he is I suggest he shops like I do in those fantastic discount supermarkets and not our leading retailer where you pay through the nose for meeting better class folk, never shop in the presence of a senior citizen

in a threadbare coat gazing myopically at two tins of soup wondering if he can afford both, or a distressed young mother telling her daughter to put back biscuits saying: “Blame your father who never pays a penny of maintenance.”

Mind you, I have friends who buy everything from this source, even toilet tissue despite my suggestion they are flushing money down the pan.

To limit the tax burden inherited by future generations I hope the new PM will limit financial aid to those in real need, not those on decent incomes so that they can continue the life style they enjoy.

Ivan W Reid, Kirkburn, Laurencekirk.