ACCORDING to a comprehensive survey carried out by YouGov for the Bevan Foundation, thousands of Welsh families are going without essential items as the cost-of-living crisis bites deep in household budgets.

The majority of people in Wales are now cutting back on essential items, and between January and July, some 57 per cent were spending less on heating, electricity and water usage, while 51 per cent reported they had cut back on buying clothes. According to the Bevan Foundation research, 45 per cent had already cut back on transport, were consciously driving less, and 39 per cent reported they were cutting back on their weekly food shopping.

The foundation estimates that one-family-in-eight has already hit breaking point, while other research shows that one-family-in-four are in fuel poverty, unable to pay their sky-high utility bills.

Right now, it is difficult for families to know where to turn to for help.

Listening to Conservative candidates Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss campaign for party votes to become the next Prime Minister, it seems as if both live in an alternative reality. The current occupant of 10 Downing Street seems to have left the building already or is too busy organising his post-politics career to care little for the millions of families up and down Britain who are struggling to make ends meet.

Instead of assistance now, there is the promise of tax cuts sooner or later, with both Messers Sunak and Truss ignoring the reality that whatever emergency measures brought in by their government just months ago to ease the cost-of-living crisis, have simply been eroded by rising bills to drive, heat, eat or simply survive.

Cost-of-living payments of £150 have been mostly handed out to those who needed it most. While the distribution was less than smooth, by the time the cheques did reach those in most need, the funds did little to ease the plight of the most over-extended.

Against this backdrop of household pain, our local authorities need to ensure that every penny entrusted to them is used wisely. That means that urgent spending reviews are needed now, there is no money for new hires, outside consultants or any of the frills our councils believe they are due, and they must cut any discretionary spend. Our newly elected councils need to show leadership, and cut their cloth to suit our measure of pain.