High Times

Opening the paper this morning made for depressing reading. Hardly a page went by without some story or another warning of dramatic price hikes catching my eye. First there was the Ryanair story which I mentioned yesterday. Then there was the news that the price of milk has increased dramatically – by around 12 cent a litre, in fact – over the last couple of weeks as retailers passed on “soaring” costs on to the consumer. “Glanbia carried these costs for many months which have now been passed on to ensure that margins return to sustainable levels,” a Glanbia spokesman said adding that the price rises were a “measured response” to unprecedented cost increases. And then there was the head of the ESB warning that price increases could be expected too. We can look forward to higher electricity bills as part of a new (and probably quite wise) policy of linking domestic prices more closely to the cost of producing electricity. “The big issue is how we get people to reduce their demand by 20 per cent. Overall, bills will not increase if this target is met,” said CEO Padraig McManus.