A farmer said he had to sell his home and move into a caravan as crippling fuel prices left him fighting to survive. Karl Hughes, a dad of three, sold his home on Tiree in the Inner Hebrides after falling behind on his mortgage.
He delivers livestock around the island but he says diesel costing £2.25 a litre at the island's only garage has led to him and others "really starting to suffer". It's thought the fuel is the most expensive in Scotland, with petrol currently coming in at £2.18 a litre.
Karl, 59, said Scots living in such remote areas were facing a cost of living disaster, with the cost of gas cylinders to heat their homes also soaring, reports the Daily Record. He has now moved into the caravan, which is parked on land where he keeps 20 sheep and a flock of chickens.
He said: “People are having to look at car-sharing because they can’t afford to fill up. We just don’t have the money. I’m living in a caravan because I had to sell my croft house. It’s all coming to a head.
“People are really starting to suffer here. We’re not on the gas mains network, so we’re all heating our houses with LPG gas bottles. They used to be about £40 and are now £60 each. In the summer, just using it for cooking, that’ll last me 10 days.”
He told how people were struggling with the price of food in the island’s main shop, the Co-op, where they are looking out for discounted food.
Karl added: “You’re seeing it etched in everyone’s faces – people are scared. You see more people buying the yellow-stickered food in the shop. The whole system is messed up. Everything feels rigged against the people who actually live here and that’s after going through Covid.
“I have to use the food bank, and I’m on Universal Credit because I don’t earn enough and there’s no extra jobs going. I’m just making ends meet.
"There’s a lot of old people here, and if we have a bad winter some of them are going to freeze to death – that’s a fact. I lived through Thatcher but things have never been as bad as this. After Covid, people were looking forward to having some hope. There isn’t any.”
Petrol prices at Tiree’s only filling station, beside the pier at Scarinish, leapt more than 20p this week. Andrew Watson, managing director of fuel price comparison website PetrolPrices.com, reckons Tiree could have the most expensive petrol in Scotland.
He said: “From the data we have this would look to be the most expensive in Scotland, although with things changing so rapidly on price it may have been overtaken.”
Frazer MacInnes, 36, has lived on Tiree all of his life and runs the Tiree Sea Tours sailing business as well as Toraz, the island’s car rental business. He said soaring fuel costs on the island have made it difficult to keep afloat.
He said: “Fuel prices are doubling in the space of a year. We’re having to pass that on to customers, which we don’t want to do, but we don’t have a choice.
“I’m certain I’ll be spending £10,000 a week on fuel in July. We’re seeing fewer customers too.”
Jenni Minto, SNP MSP for Argyll and Bute, says the situation in Scotland's rural communities isn't being spoken about enough.
"I have no recollection of petrol prices going up so much in such a short period of time and I've had people raise it with me a lot," she said. "It's really impacting on how rural people live their lives because they need their cars to get about, more than in a city. I recognise the challenges and the additional costs they see.
"Bringing down the cost of fuel is within the gift of the UK Government but barely a day goes by without me speaking to somebody in the Scottish Government to tell them: 'Remember the islanders'. This is something I raise regularly in parliament and the Scottish Government is listening more to the way islanders operate.
"Kate Forbes, the finance secretary, has written to Westminster to talk about the increased costs in Scotland and has put forward solutions more widely: increasing social security benefits, reinstating the Universal Credit uplift and increasing the National Living Wage to the Real Living Wage.
"We are doing things but I think the fact it's being talked about can only help."
