The UK’s slow progress on home insulation is costing bill payers an eye-watering £3.2 billion per year, new research has found. No one likes a draughty house. But analysis by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit has revealed just how much inadequate insulation really costs us. If the average UK home was upgraded one energy efficiency band – from an Energy Performance Certificate rating of D to a rating of C – each consumer would save £200 annually, the think tank found. For the 4.4 million homes rated E or F, the bill payer would save even more: some £400 or £550 respectively. Governmen ..read more

A few years ago, Labour pledged to abolish private schools. Such plans – drawn up under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership – are a distant memory. Yet the party is once again under fire for its position on fee-paying schools. Keir Starmer has promised to end tax breaks for the independent school sector in the UK, scrapping VAT exemptions on school fees. Compared to the abolition promises of the Corbyn era, the plan is a modest one. But it has sections of the Conservative-leaning media up in arms. The problem with UK’s film industry? It’s easier to win an Oscar if you went to private school Th ..read more

A London council, which apologised after workers destroyed rough sleepers’ tents last year, is under the spotlight again for “forcibly removing” people from the doorstep of its own offices. Streets Kitchen’s Elodie Berland told the Big Issue around eight or nine people who had been sleeping rough in tents outside the Camden Council offices at Pancras Square were displaced on Friday (31 May) afternoon to make way for building work. The group had been sleeping rough outside the £123m council base, which opened in 2014, for a few months in a bid to get support, she added. Once again @CamdenCo ..read more

Great British Energy is live – or at least, its website is. Labour has long-pledged to establish a publicly owned national energy company if it wins the general election. The clean energy firm – one of the party’s ‘six first priorities’ for government – would invest public money in renewable projects like wind farms and solar panels. Today (31 May), Keir Starmer unveiled GBR’s website and logo, reiterating his promise to end the “pain and misery” of the cost of living crisis. “Our clean power mission with Great British Energy will take back control of our destiny and invest in cheap, clean h ..read more

The world’s first museum dedicated to homelessness finally has a home. And it’s probably the world’s first museum to have a black bin bag as a headline exhibit too. The Museum of Homelessness (MOH) has existed for a decade but the search for a home has been a long one which has ironically mirrored the community it represents. Co-founders Jess and Matt Turtle have set up alongside friends from The Outside Project at the Clerkenwell Fire Station or at Streets Kitchen’s Solidarity Hub in London over the years. At one point they have even set up an exhibition on the street, displaying objects in ..read more

Visiting a sewer in Calcutta in the early ’90s left a lasting impression on Liam Fox. A minister in the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office at the time, appointed by then-PM John Major, Fox remembers his sanitation revelation.    “We were basically just putting in piping to stop sewage flowing down a street. It was the reaction of the people that struck me. We might as well have given them a goldmine because clearly it made such a difference to their quality of life.  Get the latest news and insight into how the Big Issue magazine is made by signing up for the Inside Big I ..read more

The Royal Mail has accepted a take-over bid from a Czech billionaire, ending 500 years of British ownership. The postal service is one of the UK’s most iconic and oldest national institutions. But campaigners and unions fear job losses after International Distribution Services – the company which owns the loss-making postal service – accepted a £5bn takeover from business tycoon Daniel Křetínsky. The Royal Mail has endured a turbulent decade since it was privatised in 2013. A sharp drop in service demand and management failings contributed to a £348m loss in the year to March 2024. If Rishi ..read more

The Big Issue’s blueprint for change is demanding that political leaders build more social housing – now new research has shown it could save private renters thousands of pounds every year and boost the economy by billions. Private renters who can’t find a social home in England are being forced to pay an extra £828 a month than social tenants, new research by Shelter revealed. The housing charity’s analysis of government rent data found private renters could save thousands of pounds a year on housing costs if they lived in the social sector. Polly Neate, Shelter chief executive, said 90,000 ..read more

Junior doctors in England will stage a five-day strike in the week before the general election. British Medical Association members will walk out from 7am on 27 June to 7am on 2 July. It is the latest escalation in a long-running pay dispute with the government and will be the 11th walkout by junior doctors since March 2023. The BMA claims that it offered the government “a final opportunity to make an offer and avoid strikes”, but that this was “not taken up”. Support our vendors with a subscription If you can’t visit you local vendor on a regular basis then it’s possible to subscribe to the ..read more

Tough choice, isn’t it? Spend the rest of your life renting, or suck it up and buy whatever property you can afford. In big cities where only flats are within the reach of most, leasehold remains the main way to enter the housing casino. It’s a feudal system which needs getting rid of. Those aren’t our words – it’s the opinion of the ruling Conservative government. But those manifesto promises have translated into rushed-through and watered-down reforms. In the meantime, residents suffer. It’s left to individual residents to take on what amounts to a second job, spending evenings combing thr ..read more