Cost-of-living increases continue to hit struggling families

StepChange Scotland has revealed a rise in people struggling to keep up with their energy bills, council tax and mortgage at the start of 2025.

New data from the charity for the final quarter of 2024 shows over one in five (21%) clients with a responsibility for paying a mortgage are in arrears, up from 14% in the same quarter of 2023.

A similar trend can be seen for the proportion of clients in arrears with their council tax (36%), which has risen by three percentage points year-on-year.

Meanwhile the proportion of clients with electricity (35%) and gas (30%) arrears has increased by five percentage points each year-on-year.

The charity says that its concerning to see a rise in clients struggling with household debt, especially as the new year and winter is always a challenging time for people dealing with debt issues.

Sharon Bell, head of StepChange Scotland, said: “Unfortunately, the new year can be particularly hard for people struggling with problem debt – Christmas puts a lot of pressure on our finances and January itself often proves to be an expensive month. This is a time when we see more people than usual coming to the charity seeking help with their finances.

“However, this January we’re also faced with a rise in the energy price cap and the same steep costs for rent, mortgage and council tax bills that have dominated the past few years.

“We’ve already started to see the proportion of clients coming to us with priority debts like energy and council tax creep up, so it’s important that both the Scottish and UK governments ensure financially vulnerable households are properly supported.”