CHARLES Dickens’s literary wisdom seems apposite, if not prophetic, for the times we’re living in.

As we begin to emerge from the winter bleakness of the Covid-19 pandemic we’re now reaping the idiocracy of Brexit and a government of fools prepared to say and do anything to cling onto power. Our bilious barnacles of Brexit.

As Dickens’s opening line in a Tale of Two Cities said: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way.”

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The massive queues of lorries approaching Dover over the weekend – from our inane self-inflicted Brexit bureaucracy – are the least of our worries. We now have a rising cost-of-living crisis. And it’s set to get much worse.

This won’t mean anything to gazillionaires who’ve made fortunes from public contracts during the Covid kleptocracy, however, it will mean everything to the millions across the UK already struggling to live from day to day.

The food writer and anti-poverty campaigner Jack Monroe has compared the cost of food staples over the last 12 months: “This time last year, the cheapest pasta in my local supermarket (one of the big four), was 29p for 500g.

“Today, the cheapest pasta is 70p for 500g. That’s a 141% price increase – and it hits the poorest and most vulnerable households the most.

“This time last year, the cheapest rice at the same supermarket was 45p for a kilogram bag. Today it’s £1 for 500g. That’s a staggering 344% price increase.

I could go on and on, curry sauce was 30p, now it’s 89p – a price increase of 196%.

“When I started writing my recipe blog 10 years ago, I could feed myself and my son Jonny on £10 a week. The exact same shop now costs £17.11 from the same supermarket.”

If you’re a single person older than 25, Universal Credit (UC) per week is £74.96.

From April this year that UC will rise by £2.33 per week, which is a 3.1% increase. If you are on a zero hours minimum wage contract life is equally tough.

Food prices are vastly outstripping household income for millions of people.

So far, the only big idea from the UK Government is to increase national insurance tax for workers and employers from April.

There are a number of excellent food initiatives across Glasgow to help people buy food at an affordable price.

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The food pantry network – currently seven across the city – provides local residents £10 to £15 worth of shopping for a £2.50 weekly membership fee. Various other community food services operate locally too.

In the south west of the city Threehills, in partnership with Good Food Scotland and Feeding Britain, is opening Scotland’s first community supermarket in Nitshill.

The project aims to deliver an affordable supermarket, cafe and resource hub for other support facilities.

Clearly, there’s a pressing need to develop this type of community service across Scotland more generally.

The other significant driver of the cost-of-living crisis is a looming hike to the cost of gas and electricity.

The UK price cap on energy costs will be announced in two weeks’ time – it’s expected to rise by around 51%, which could add around £600 per annum to average utility bills from April 1.

This hike is likely to impact one half of all households across the UK – 11 million consumers.

The remainder of people on fixed term deals won’t be affected until later. The problem with the energy price cap is the free market isn’t working.

At present you cannot switch to a cheaper deal because there aren’t any. VAT is presently charged at 5% on domestic fuel bills – Ofgem estimates scrapping VAT would only save a household an average of £61 per year.

If you’re worried about money or debts you can visit Govan Law Centre’s debtnavigator.scot for information and help. You can chat to a qualified money advisor or solicitor online for free.

We need leadership from both the UK and Scottish governments on how we tackle our cost-of-living crisis.

Strategic market interventions are needed.

New ideas and solutions are urgently required to support those most at risk. And that includes ensuring local government has additional funding to deliver essential services at the coalface of our communities.