The outlook: Gloomy

A bit later than planned, but I wanted to check all my maths corresponded with my bank account!

And it would seem that the prediction I made towards the end of the project for the BBC was pretty accurate - as listed below:

		Previous month	4 week experiment
Mortgage	Move from fixed rate to tracker	1200	950
Utilities	Reduce energy consumption	125	90
Council tax	Unchanged	90	90
Public transport	Walk more	30	10
Supermarket shop	Sacrifice quality for price	120	90
Breakfast, lunch, snacks	Abolish consumption	75	0
Eating out	Reduce and buy cheapest items	160	100
Beer	Ring fenced	100	100
Entertainment	Abolish gig, cinema, museum tickets etc	80	10
Helped by having National Trust & English Heritage passes for my birthday
Other expenses		100	100
Totals		2080	1540

I cut by around 25%. Great. More than the government did (average 19% across departments).

Now, what to do with my £500+ savings.

Well sadly, I think they will all be used up by five main things (I keep thinking of more):
- The increase in VAT from 1st Jan to 20%
- Increased NI contributions
- Increased rail, tube and fuel fares
- Saving to cover any increase in interest rates
- Taking out unemployment insurance on my mortgage

The scary thing about this is that not only have I taken over £500 out of the consumer economy (the one which big business and the government needs to create jobs), but most of this money will need to be immediately spent on increased taxes, subsidies or saved to offset future potential problems.

You don't need to be a Nobel Prize winning economist to see that this doesn't spell great news for the British economy.

So perhaps the real learning of this experiment hasn't been about the rigour and difficulty in cutting so fast and deep into spending. The real lesson is that economically, people WILL need to save to ensure they can sustain their current lives as a result of the government's policies. And for those who can save, great, but money will come out of the economy as a result. For those who don't have anywhere else to cut, life is going to get very tough indeed.

The aftermath... delayed...

Sorry folks, my summary will be delayed til Wednesday as I spent all day bathing in champagne and eating foie gras.

OK, so I was actually doing a week's worth of washing, trying to shave off ten days of beard (painful... not shaving is a cost saving I would love to implement) and cooking dinner for my partner's family.

No excessive spending though you'll be pleased to hear. Although I did return to organic beef and British produced veg for the lasagna I made.

And tomorrow is the PRCA Awards (free dinner, free wine, big hangover)!

Day 28: The final hurdle

Still in the Midlands for my final day of the cuts challenge!

Four weeks of watching what I spend at every opportunity, scrounging off others, experimenting with no food and ring fencing my ale...

I'll do a proper summing up tomorrow when I get back to London and trawl through my bank statements.

So just focussing on today I continued to confine myself to the golden rules, I spent less than £10 on a lovely roast (actually got two courses for under £9 at an Ember Inn) and a train ticket back to London which, while technically for tomorrow should still count (£26 which is pretty extortionate for a single 'advance' fare).

I didn't make a category for non TfL transport, but like the costs on fuel, what can you do? Either refuse to travel to see people or pay up for as little as possible...

I won't be stopping seeing friends, family or beautiful places in Britain or around the world. So here's one final last minute ring fencing.

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Day 27: Tuns of ale

Another frugal day. The morning started with radio interviews talking about my challenge on Radio York and the World Service.

Why York? Well I was there anyway on my cuts tour (cheaper beer, average priced meals - I used to spend a lot of time there so knew where to look) and when The World Today wanted to speak to me, York asked if they could add me onto their discussion on the York cuts protest. Who was I to say no?!

The best discovery in York was the £3 ale sampler in The Three Tuns - a third of a pint of three different ales. Amazing.

Today, it's down to the Midlands and my Dad's for free dinner and lodgings. Listening again to the interviews, he's very surprised at how interested people are... As am I!

You can listen again to Radio York http://bbc.in/bagKkK(1.20 in) and World Service http://bbc.in/3URsWD (43min)... If you really want!

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Day 26: Fuel poverty

Today's spending has been very modest indeed. This Big Society principle is paying off.

One of my friends has questioned how I am actually funding this trip around the UK, the answer is the Big Society.

My partner's family are over from Australia and they decided to do a road trip, so they are paying for the car. My contribution has been to steer the trip in the direction of places where I can get a free bed from friends.

That's meant that for the cost of a couple of hotel rooms, I've had a lovely week off and just spending on the essentials.

True, I have eaten out a bit more than I would normally, but I've been sticking either to ring fenced or cheap items (last nights smoked sausage dinner from an Edinburgh chippy a case in point).

But I was surprised by the cost of lunch today. A baguette in Warmbridge, Northumberland, was £4.50. This North/South divide becomes less evident the more you eat out.

The other big expense on this trip, which I don't normally have, is on fuel for the car. I'm glad I can normally rely on my feet or public transport as £1.19 / £1.22 a litre is really steep and with fuel price increases on the way I can see that a driver trying this experiment would really struggle.

And as, presumably for the public sector this is a cost they can't do anything about, for every penny fuel costs rise, they will have to save elsewhere.

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Day 25: Best of British

The big day... The Spending Review coverage is in and the public reaction seems to be that 'something must be done' but none of the things which have been announced by the Coalition.

Firstly it's worth noting that the average cuts are reported as being just 19%... Now I've managed to cut 26%, so I shall wait for George and Danny to ask me to advise them!

Well, in case they don't...

What's striking about the coverage is that it appears the numbers are still being reported at headline level and as I have said before, the devil is always in the detail.

And the detail is where comparisons with my own tiny experiment can be drawn.

Take a occupational therapist who takes their client (dread term) out to a cuppa to discuss their issues once a week. For some people, getting to the stage of going to a certain cafe once a week may be a major achievement. Under the 27% cuts to local government, does this worker now have to spend 73p rather than £1 on the tea? Does this mean going to a new place? Will it mean unsettling the client? Will the client regress and need support for longer, costing the tax payer more?

Or the social worker who no longer has the budget to take a young person on a day trip at which they confide to them they have been abused. What cost to society of not helping this child?

Yes, these are very specific issues which, government will say is upto local authorities to sort out. But who is checking local authorities? Not the Audit Commission or Standards England (axed quangos). Ofsted maybe, but with reduced budget to deliver the same service?

My concern is not that cuts are needed, but that this level of thinking through is not being done by ministers.

Anyway, this is getting all very political. Best go back to the purpose of the blog...

Edinburgh is not a cheap city, £3.25 pints, £10 dinner, £11 to enter Dynamic Earth.

This last bit of spending made me think of the other consequence of the Review... If the cuts mean museums are no longer free or the cost of travel rises, all the savings I've made so far could be wiped out by maintaining a life where I actually go and see the best of what Britain has to offer.

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Day 24: Local game

Been trying to keep up with the comments after my appearance on BBC News Online. It was interesting to see the comments from readers, most of which at least supported the idea of the experiment... If not having much sympathy!

But that, as I think the piece explained was never the point... In fact I loved hearing one of my friends describe it as a (badly spelled) 'Adrian Mole for PRs'!

So onwards with my struggle and it seems cheapness peaked in Glasgow. The journey north to Inverness via Fort Augustus was amazingly beautiful... And of course going to beautiful countryside is pretty cheap.

Lunch foodwise was pretty cheap £5.50 for locally produced venison burger. But the pint of IPA was £3.25.... almost back to London prices!

At least the venison was local produce, which helps make me feel better about the poor deer I devoured, a comment from a reader which got me thinking about the ethical compromises you have to make in this cuts business.

I'll spend a bit more time digesting folks comments and sum up in a few days time...

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Day 23: Smiles better

Glasgow had a brilliant 80s ad campaign proclaiming it was smiles better (than everywhere else presumably). As someone who spent too many years in Edinburgh, I'm not sure I can entirely agree.

It is cheap though... £2.65 for an ale (getting lower the further north I get) and a haggis dinner (now there's an amazing dish ripe for ring fencing) £8.95 at the impressive Committee Room No. 9 bar in Merchant City.

I also had a free trip round the Kelvingrove let's hope free museums aren't axed in the Comprehensive Spending Review tomorrow.

Speaking of which, the BBC have asked if they can use some extracts from my column as part of their Review coverage. They've asked me to sum up where I got to so far, so here goes:

With just a few days left to go, it's clear that I'm going to fail to reduce my spending by 40%.

The devil of this experiment has been in the detail. Setting an arbitrary cuts target was appealing three weeks ago, but once it was clear that my mortgage and my utility bills couldn't be cut by the 40% level, I knew I'd have to start sacrificing ring fenced areas such as food, travel and even ale.

This means sacrificing not just ethics and principles, but a social life.

My message to the politicians facing a similar challenge is that while it's easy to make headline promises and take easy decisions to axe frivolous spending, make sure that when you get down to he detail you don't go so far that the UK becomes the equivalent of a miserly hermit!

So although I won't make 40% I still want to spend the last 7 days seeing how far I can get... Can I do better than the 26% I think I'm upto right now...

Keep reading!

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Day 22: The glorious North

I do love Northern England, the cities exuding a former unimaginable wealth, the windswept platforms of stations taking you to towns whose original purposes were destroyed in economic downturns of the past, the stunning countryside and a resilience and pride which is unfashionable further south.

It's also a fair bit cheaper... Which helps my current challenge.

But with he regeneration of Liverpool over the past decade, the tourist areas proved difficult pickings for saving 40%.

Yesterday's Liverpool spend:
- £3.50 on return bus fare
- £3 on Everton programme
- £3.20 on Scouse pie and hot drink at Goodison
- £3 for a pint in the Cavern Club
- £10 for steak and chips in the Pumphouse at Albert Dock

So not quite a 40% saving on my basics, but heading there.

I also spent £5 on backing Everton to win the derby, so recouped some money there. Maybe betting, gambling and other forms of credit speculation is the way forward; if I can't save 40% maybe I just need to acquire more cash?!

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Day 21: A North/South divide?

Following work's (understandable) reluctance to move to Bratislava to help fund my 40% cuts challenge, it's time to see if the rest of the UK can help me.

For the next week I'm on a road trip to see if I can get 40% cuts in disposable spending by being in a different city.

Liverpool, Glasgow, Inverness, Edinburgh, York and Coventry are on the list to check London prices against the rest of the country.

Let's start by setting out some benchmarks:
- Pint of real ale (non wetherspoons): £3.20
- Loaf of posh bread: £1.19
- Sandwich: £3.50
- Steak and chips (gastropub): £16
- Cheapest gastropub main: £9.50
- Bus fare: £2 (£1.20 on Oyster)

Other spending I'll compare along the way...

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Day 20: Une guillotine et une Satan

First off, apologies if I got the gender of the beers above wrong.

Both are amazing. And both, like NHS doctors from the EU deserve to be protected from cuts. They do a very good job (posts passim for my equation of ale with the NHS).

And what I also loved about my mission to the land of child abusing, AIDS prejudiced Catholic preachers was how cheap it was.

A hearty breakfast of Porridge and fruit from my hosts in Leuven and a lunch of potage du jour et pain (soup and bread... I hate it when people don't translate) was enough to sustain me.

A couple of bowls of peanuts and some crisps hastily purchased after a long session in Delirium Cafe added to my food intake.

While I'm slightly concerned that my 'defence' (food) budget has been compromised for that of the 'nhs' (ale) at least my spending for the whole Belgian trip is under €40.

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Day 19: Another diplomatic mission

Weddings are costly businesses - and not just for the bride and groom.

This weekend is the stag do of a friend, which normally I'd be throwing myself into with gusto.

However, all diplomatic missions must now be fully assessed for cost effectiveness.

Luckily the choice for this stag do is Brussels and, in addition to bagging the cheapest Eurostar tickets possible, I also have friends in Belgium.

And friends now mean free accommodation and free or cheap food with my cuts goggles on.

So with any luck today's spending will be limited to a few ring fenced Belgian beers (proper ones, none of that Stella stuff, that's not ring fenced, lager doesn't deserve NHS protected status)!

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Day 18: The Defence of the Realm

This lack of food may be cheap, but I just don't think it's sustainable.

Woke up hungry with my stomach making some very odd noises.

But I must try and recoup my losses from the Vienna diplomatic incident.

So, more toast (last of bread now gone and running dangerously low on honey).

No bread means no lunch. Hopes on eating today lie with there being a meeting at work with leftovers I can scrounge (another example of why pay if someone else is prepared to).

Down to our offices in Tottenham Court Road (TfL tax paid). During the really interesting meeting my stomach starts making noises which I can only assume mean it's now digesting itself.

On the way back to Camden on Inverness Street I crack. I must eat.

£4 for a homemade meat Calzone. The shame. But it tasted good.

While spending this week has been really minimal, I think I still need to eat. So I'll need to ringfence another item. I suppose eating is similar to front line armed forces... It's not like you can get rid of them and it does need to be properly funded...



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Day 17: Friezeloading

This no buying food idea really has legs!

Again I used more fridge food for breakfast and lunch. And found a brand new way of cutting - freeloading!

A man in my position gets invited to hospitality events every now and then. I only normally accept if there is a realistic chance I'll then buy from the supplier - or if their account with us is up for review.

But given my need for savings I figured it's time to accept whatever's going.

So a fantastic evening was had at the Frieze art fair with good beer and champagne. I also had great fun being the only one there without an 'interesting' hair cut or stupid looking facial hair.

But on the downside there was no food. The closest I came to dinner was when a waiter mistook our party for another one and I was able to swipe a field mushroom bruschetta.

Back too late for dinner and while my spending was zero today, my hunger is increasing.

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Day 16: Back to business

So work didn't go for my relocation plan. So I need to focus on cuts in London again.

And success.

I always used to say it cost £25 just to wake up in London. I had no proof of this, but was just an indication of how expensive i felt the city was. But today I spent £0 of non ring fenced money.

Yes £0.00.

Had leftover food in fridge for breakfast and lunch... Walked to the pub after work and spent just £10 on beer at the lovely Prince Arthur on Eversholt Street (well lovely apart from the toilets).

Was too late for dinner when I left the pub, but rather than sink to suspicious chicken or McDonalds dinner, I just went to sleep.

So maybe that's a solution, if I can't move to Bratislava, stop eating dinner?

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Day 15: A Prague Spring

I love this place. Life is so cheap. I thought all the talk of 15p beer was all bravado, but it's all true.

I have no idea what the exchange rate is, but my only sizeable expense here has been my entry to the castle and an audio tour.

I suppose I didn't strictly need this audio guide, but I hate going to places and not knowing what I'm looking at.

Buy a guide book you say? No, that's too costly. Not when I have a perfectly serviceable Rough Guide to Europe from 1998. Sure the currencies, travel info and even the political situation in some of the books is very different, but it works as an overview.

And after my Prague cheapness it's back to London on Whizz Air. Yes it sounds dodgy, but it sure is cheap. And to my own amusement it was the BA flight back which was delayed by the late arrival of the inbound flight.

Have a bit of a shock though on landing... For exactly the same price as my Budapest to Prague train, in the UK I can get from Luton Airport Parkway to Kentish Town.

Oh the glamour.

Maybe the solution to the whole cuts challenge is just to move to eastern Europe... Wonder what work will say to that idea?

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Day 14: Things to 'do' in... Bratislava

After finishing off the spend of my allocated florins, time to get the train to Bratislava.

I'm realising on this trip that it is obviously my partner who does most of the planning on holidays as I arrived into Bratislava station with just a map in my Rough Guide to Europe 1998 edition.

Tim would have printed off wikipedia entries, maps, or at least got me to get a guidebook.

But even without these sources of information I've struggled to spend any money today...

At Bratislava station I was delighted to realise they used the Euro and I had €20 in my wallet left from Vienna. Great I thought, let's limit spending to this.

If only it were that easy to spend money in Slovakia.

Bratislava castle is still bring restored (been happening since 1953 apparently). So no charge. Two postcards cost €1.60.

Cathedral is free. All museums shut as it's Sunday in this (apparently) very Catholic country.

Lunch... €3 for a coffee and a salmon sandwich. Free wifi included.

Still time to pass so after another walk around the historic quarter to check I hadn't missed anything, retreated to a pub for more free wifi and a very tasty dark beer (€1.60).

Salami baguette and litre of water at station for train to Prague was just €2.10

So a day out for under €10. Pretty good.

Finished the day in Prague with another exceedingly cheap beer and chance to put my feet up... This diplomatic mission sure is hard work on my feet if not my wallet!



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Day 13: 6,000 Forint

After yesterday's pretty disastrous spending, the diplomatic budget was reigned in today.

A 10k run along the Danube ensured I saw lots in the morning for free and my 24 hour travel card got me to the station, via the impressive Hofburg Palace area of Vienna.

Ticket to Budapest was €22 (prebooked, would have been a whole €26 had I just turned up).

Spending in Budapest:
- Ticket to Bratislava and Prague: 2,134 ft
- 2 large red wines at wine festival on Castle Hill: 1,200 ft
- Splash out on beer and wine on balcony: 1,600 ft
- Goulash and beer near Kalvin Ter: Partner paid, but roughly same as the drinks bought at tourist trap
- Use of WC: 160 ft

Leaving me enough change from 6,000 ft to buy some bottled water (given toxic sludge disaster, probably best to avoid Hungarian tap water) and breakfast on Day 14.

Think this works out at roughly £30... not bad for a day of diplomacy. And did I mention the weather's amazing?

Day 12: The idiot strikes again

I have a love hate relationship with travelling. I love it, it conspires to bring out the worst in me.

Given that city breaks in the UK or Europe are an important bit of my life, it was only right that I attempt one during my cuts programme.

And just like the Government, I'm finding it tricky to find savings in my diplomatic budget!

My attempt was honourable... I selected a mini tour of East Europe (cheaper than usual haunts in Scandinavia by a significant percentage) and chose train over flying once I got to Vienna.

It was getting there that was the problem.

Flights (BA there, Whizz back from Prague) were chosen on a total cost (ie including full cost of getting to airport and check in fees, which ruled out Ryanair). So far so good... Some savings there.

But the bit of travelling which brings out the worst is packing... Or more accurately stuffing things into a bag and then realising too late I don't have something and having an unnecessary spend at the airport.

This time only stayed for 2 beers at a leaving do the night before, got home early and packed. Then went to bed early...

I woke up at 2am with one of those 'shit I forgot something' starts. My passport. "Should I get out of bed and put in my bag" I thought. "No," said my sleepy brain.

Up at 4... Get showered and get on bus to tube all going well, was set to get the cheap stopping train from Paddington when I realised... Shit I'd forgotten my passport.

Cursing the lazy part of myself that had slept rather than packing it, I spent £30 on a return taxi trip to Kentish Town. Arriving to make the 625am Heathrow Express (£22), my journey to the airport which was supposed to cost a tenner, cost five times that. But at least I made my plane so didn't have to spend another £300 changing my flights (given my partner was already waiting for me in Vienna, cancelling wasn't an option, unless I wanted a diplomatic crisis on my hands!

I'm an idiot... Will now have to find a way to make those savings from elsewhere in my planned diplomatic expenses...

Day 11: Compulsory Purchase

Only spending today was an annual commitment.

Early every October its time to get the flat ready for winter.  I love the autumn, not just because it's my birthday or the amazing views you get though mist and fog, but because it means it's almost time to start having fires.

So at 7am this morning, the chimney sweep came round and in ten minutes, the soot is gone and - when coupled with the mass clean my partner and I did on Saturday - the flat is ready for winter.

While it costs £50 for the sweep, avoiding a chimney fire is pretty compulsory - and the price hasn't gone up in 3 years.

So no reduction, but no increase either!

Day 10: Mortgage Day

10 days and my first missed post. For someone who's been a sporadic blog poster in the past, I still think this is a major achievement.

Yet, day 10 of the cuts challenge is an important one.  It's Mortgage Day.

This is one of the only bits of the challenge that took some advance planning (this Friday will see more).  My excellent mortgage adviser and I have been in, let's just call it, frequent contact trying to pin down Halifax on a new mortgage (oh, you know, the usual lost forms, reneging on rates, etc, etc, ad nauseum).

6th October was the first day of my new mortgage. And for all their faults, once all had been sorted out, Halifax are proving a damn sight more human than Standard Life (now part of Barclays apparently) in the contact I've had with them and the solicitors.

And the saving... well.  It's pretty significant, 20%, but because I have moved to a tracker from a fixed to get this deal, I will have to save the difference to ensure I am covered for future rate rises (even if it will need a rise of at least 2.5% for me to start paying more than I was before).

But this is obviously a blow, as it's not 40%.  Now either I shrug my shoulders and try to find savings elsewhere in my monthly spend to make up for this (roughly around £250 of additional savings) or I adopt a lenient approach to the banks as Government has done and allow this to go buy.

Having been critical of this kow-towing to the financiers in the past, I should stick to my guns and go for the saving.

The £40 a head dinner and drinks at Garlic & Shots last night didn't help.  So I need to go into the next 20 days or so with a renewed effort!

Day 9: Socking it to BoJo

TfL spending ringfenced huh?

Oh, Boris... you thought you'd escaped from my cuts.

But today's brainwave comes from accidentally leaving my wallet at home.

Meeting down in Tottenham Court Road meant that all of a sudden I was without my Oyster card (which, while I don't have a travel card as I walk to work, I do have auto top up which means I just keep using it and it just keeps letting me).

A quick email around work finds a willing comrade to lend me their Oyster with a pre-paid travel card.

So, between borrowing Oysters and walking more, I reckon I can impose at least a 75% cut on TfL travel.

And, no I won't be using any of Boris' bloody bikes that are swamping the streets and pavements either.

Forget wallet = £0 spending. Result.

Day 8: Shop til I drop

I may be a week in, but I've only really been playing at this cuts business. I need to start making some tough choices and really start cutting. 

Saturday was a trip to Sainsbury's to do a weekly shop so chance to do some benchmarking (lovely PR phrase, sorry)...

Bottled water: Hideous expense. 4 litre bottles of Volvic (useful for going to the gym) is £3.60.  Today I spent £3 on a 750ml water bottle from JD Sports, so I no longer have to buy these. 100% cut.

Lunch: £2 for 2 bags of rocket, 70p for a cucumber, £1.19 for a loaf of bread, £1.29 for some hummous. Lunch for a week £5.18.  75% saving compared to buying 5 Pret sandwiches (about £15-£20)

Weekend breakfast: 2 packs of bacon £5.58, free range organic eggs £1.63.  The only savings here would be to stop buying British bacon (for some reason Sainsbury's own brand basic bacon is only Dutch... and is full of water anyway) or to go for battery eggs.  Having debated my chicken dilemma I really think I'd rather be vegetarian than eat battery hens / cows / pigs.

5 a day: 4 litres of Tropicana fruit juice (on special, 2 for £3). Nectarines (buy one get one free). Bag of Cox's apples £1.99 (cheaper than buying individually).  Only way of saving here is getting juice made from concentrate, but reckon that's not as good for you...

Tea: £1.99 for large box of Peppermint tea.  Seems reasonable... 

Snacks: 99p for a big bag of Bombay mix.  Not very good for you, but very tasty. Reckon this is probably a luxury. All snacks abolished.

Beauty aisle: Hideously expensive.  Think this sums up much of the problem, quality or cost. It's tough.  Deodorant was 2 for 1, so that seems like a bargain (although you have to look out for supermarkets being tricky on these deals). Moisturiser £7.99... I've tried cheaper but they just don't work as well. Toothpaste £2... again experience tells me that if I want a toothpaste to work, stick with what works. Corsodyl everyday mouthwash £4.40 or Listerine for £2... I prefer my mouth to be clean, not stripped of life, so stick with Corsodyl. Shower gel £2.85, not bad and it's stuff (Menex) which doesn't dry your skin.

Anyway, enough of this advertising for products.  Using Mysupermarket, it seems that Sainsbury's is as cheap as Tesco, Asda and Ocado.  So next week I'll try Morrisons or the new Aldi on Camden High Street... or sacrifice my quality and ethics.

Day 7: What price a roast?

You've been saving all week, you have a hangover and your partner's mum has flown for 26 hours to be in the country.

In these circumstances, only a roast will do... and a good one at that.

After a day of walking (to save on TfL spending) around London's sights and relative modesty (after spending £35 last night on alcohol), a trip to the Holly Bush was well earned.

An amazing pub, selling a full range of Fullers excellent ales (including the lovely Discovery and the rarer Seafarers) and what I can only describe as the best Sunday Roast in north London (sorry Oxford, you've just lost your crown).

The price of this roast? £14. Not good considering the same thing at a Wetherspoons is about half the price.

Can I bring myself to pledge only to east Wetherspoons roasts? Well no... but given that the bread and olives arrived with the main course (why?!) and I sent them back, I did save an additional £4.50.  

I can happily pledge not to buy bread and olives anymore when eating out (a 24% saving) and not spend more than a tenner on a roast dinner - meaning a total saving of 45%. 

And people wonder why you can't trust people who work in PR when they come up with 'official' figures...

Day 6: Go Spoons

Last night didn't turn out exactly as planned as the birthday party in Camden spilled over to the Hawley.

But still relatively low spend and even dinner at Bintang on Kentish Town Road was under a tenner (it is an amazing restaurant, even if your not on a budget, you should go).

Today's spend has been a pricey (£100) trip to Sainsburys - analysis of the bill later. Followed by a night at the Wetherspoons (ongoing) before guest list spots at Crimes Against Pop.

Lovely burger at the Spoons and some decent ale... May have to come back, especially if more people have arguments at the bar that start with "I don't want you to marry me, I don't even want you to talk to me."

Day 5: Standby for beer

The weekend approaches so time to start cranking up the spending - and perversely therefore the savings!


Friday's are usually pretty good as there is a bar at work - it opened today at 3.30.  Coupled with the array of savoury snacks and cakes assembled for a colleague's birthday, I can leave the office a couple of bottles of Staropramen and a mildly lined stomach to the good.


The plan is to head to a pub for a former colleague's leaving do (read someone's card must be behind the bar) before meeting up with the partners' friends (when the spending starts). 


Weekend will be full of blagging my way onto guest lists, trying to persuade people to drink in Wetherspoons (you can still have efficiency savings even when ringfencing ale spending) and sponging off my partner's mum who lands in the UK on Sunday morning. 


But on reflection, is too much sponging really in the rules?  


This is about cuts, not being a student again. And the coalition government is trying to avoid going cap in hand to anyone.  


But then, the principles of the Big Society seem to be don't spend money on something you could get someone else to do for free.


So, when is it sponging and when is it just civil society doing its duty?


Anyway, it's probably wise not to blog when drunk, so until tomorrow... 

Day 4: What a load of gas

No real spending today... so time to start on the the 'fixed' costs.

First up, energy. 

In the last year I've increased the consumption of gas by 17% and of electricity by 25%.

If I can reduce my energy use back to 2009 levels (fingers crossed we don't have a cold snap), that would be start.

But given part of the increase in electricity was due to cooking at home more last year, this may be difficult to reduce massively.  So, what do the price comparison sites say?

Current supplier, British Gas' site gives an error message when I try and enter my details and moneysupermarket doesn't carry any listings for my postcode.

USwitch was the only site that would actually give me any results, but suggested that if I swapped I would end up paying at least £172 a year MORE!

Think I'll give British Gas a call tomorrow and see if there's anything I can do...

But as for savings today: 0.

Day 3: A Chicken Based Triumph

A major victory today.

Apart from my compulsory TfL spending, I've had a frugal day.

Only expenditure has been on dinner. Should I buy the free range Chicken fillets and cook them quickly in some breadcrumbs, or something (£5) OR the £2 for 4 Southern Fried Chicken.  Well, no contest really - processed chicken it was.

Add to that the £1.50 for 2 sweetcorn and my dinner cost just £2.50. A 60% saving.

The only downside is that I couldn't help but read the label.  9% of the cheap chicken was actually water.  And the meat was the 'produce of Britain and Brazil'.  So let's face it, these chickens won't have had a happy life.

So, here's the ethical dilemma. Fuck chicken welfare and keep with the cuts or spend more and try and ensure an ethical treatment of the animals I eat.

I know what the government would want me to do...

Day 2: The tragedy of a Baked Camembert

Today was meant to be a day of triumph. 

Oh how I was going gloat on my successes of having friends round for dinner and thus saving them and me money.  "40% a doddle" or "cuts are simples" may have even been the headline.

But then I failed to go to Sainsbury's (note the Morrison's option is not being deployed yet) and so had hungry friends sat expectantly on the couch, pining for food.

So off to the Oxford.  And, avoiding the £17 steak (is inflation now running at 6.3% as compared to the other week?), I went for a £12 lamb (saving 29.4%) and a couple of pints of Deuchars IPA (VERY ring-fenced).

This is a problem as that saving is nowhere near where I want to be... 


In fact, it is obscene. Waste if you will.  Why should such fancy goods be allowed.  We must get tough and abolish all excessive consumption.


So, I will have to go to the lowest cost item on the menu at these Gastropubs.  Today that would have been a Baked Camembert at £10 (oh those poor PRs having to make do on Camembert, I hear you cry)... well it would have been a 41% saving based on a steak.

And while there are no real savings today, there is a new pledge... At all gastropubs only the cheapest item on the mains menu may be purchased. And no more than two trips a week to such establishments.

The Rules and Pledges

The log of all the pledges and cuts I make during this experiment.

The original challenge is here.

04.10: No more bottled water, saving £3.60 a week. Make own lunch, saving upto £15 a week. All snacks abolished.


03.10: No bread and olives to be purchased in pubs. No roasts to be consumed costing more than a tenner.

01.10: Don't sponge off people excessively.  But take from those who are giving (i.e. the Big Society rule).


30.09: Reduce energy consumption back to 2009 levels in real terms.


29.09: Ignore animal welfare.  Spending on meat cut 60%



28.09: Excessive food spending abolished. Only lowest price meals in Gastropubs may be purchased. A 41% cut on what could be purchased.


28.09: No more than two Gastropub meals a week

27.09: Cutting breakfast and coffee by £19.25 a week. 100% cut.

27.09: All spending on real ale ring fenced. It's like the NHS.

27.09: All spending on TfL ring fenced. It's like DfID.

Day 1: The Coffee Chronicles

So day one of my cuts challenge is here.

It's not been a good day to be fair.

100% of my voluntary spending has been on coffee and alcohol.

First off £3.85 for breakfast: One Soya Latte (yes, yes, very PR I know) and one pain au raisin.

Then £2.00 for a Nero's during a meeting.

Frankly, I think this caffeinated extravagance should be cut.  

This, really, is similar to the axing of 'think pods' or slashing the pot plants budget of mid sized government department.

So from tomorrow, I will eat toast and honey and brew my own coffee in the morning. It just means having to get up 15 minutes earlier... I know this is a sacrifice, but that's the cutting business for you.

Obviously I feel sorry for the employees of Nero's who will see their takings reduce by at least £19.25 a week, but I imagine that other areas of the economy will replace this sad loss.

The alcohol consumption was £2.95 for a pint of Well's IPA.  I see no need to cut this as I have decided that spending on real ale is ring fenced. A sort of NHS I guess.

I also spent an involuntary c.£4 on tube fares.  This spending may also need to be ring fenced as I can't really cut TfL. I almost have an obligation to use it, so let's assume that has a DfID status.  Of course, it may get axed if things get really tough.

The countdown to cuts day

Nice pub, expensive steak

So time to explain the cuts challenge to a few colleagues and my partner. 


Colleagues are generally supportive if questioning of why I'd bother.


But they did start poking around on the 'what ifs'... So I'll probably need to set some rules.


My partner, was a little less certain.


Maybe I should have talked the plan through with him first.


I think he's grown accustomed to nice weekend pub lunches and doesn't want to trade the Oxford for the Wetherspoon's Ice Wharf.  I explained that he didn't need to... Say I would usually have the steak (Oxford price around £16 - extortion I know), all I need to do is have a lentil mousaka (nearer £9.50).


But of course that all depends on how it's going. If I don't make 40% on one thing, I'll need to save more on another... So by week 3 my Wetherwrap aversion may have to be overcome if I'm going to succeed.


At the end of the day though, he's on holiday for 2 weeks of the experiment, so if he comes back to me eating Tesco value baked beans and drinking special brew, I imagine he'll just find it funny.

The challenge

This may be a fools errand, or even a monumentally stupid idea.  I don't think I'll succeed at anyrate.  But, with any luck, this blog may at least be mildly entertaining for the next 4 weeks.

Back in July, the government ordered all departments to find 40% of cuts in spending.

In my industry, public relations, we've seen this become a reality - and on my other blog you can read more about what I feel about that.

But can I do this in my own life?

Well, we'll soon find out... Starting on Monday 27th September, this blog will track my progress as I try and spend 4 weeks cutting 40% from my own outgoings.

At worst I'll fail. At best I may save some extra cash and get some new clothes or a holiday or something.