00:01I'm here in the suburb of Ringwood.
00:04So this is one of the suburbs of Melbourne that a lot of people are facing mortgage stress.
00:09This is where they're spending more than 30% of their income on mortgage repayments.
00:14Now I've been speaking to individuals and businesses this morning about the effect of free interest rate rises on them
00:21and how that is feeding into their lives.
00:24They're saying that they've had to cut back spending not just discretionary spending,
00:28so not just holidays and things like that.
00:30But they're having to not use the heater.
00:33They're struggling to pay electricity bills.
00:36They're sometimes having to forego medication.
00:40All sorts of stories like this about the effect of the rate rises.
00:44They're very upset with the Reserve Bank.
00:47They're saying that they don't understand why the Reserve Bank has to keep raising interest rates
00:52that might affect them more than it affects people who can actually afford to spend.
00:59And they're hoping that the Reserve Bank now, that it's raised rates three times, will now leave rates on hold.
01:06Of course, that's at odds with what economists are saying.
01:09They're saying there could be at least one more rate rise this year.
01:13I've also been speaking to financial counsellors and they're saying that they're talking to people who are now in severe
01:21mortgage stress.
01:22They've had thousands, tens of thousands of callers from the start of this year.
01:27The month of April has been one of the busiest in terms of calls to the debt helpline.
01:32And they're saying that people are just trying to do everything to survive, to hold on to their homes.
01:38So that, as I've mentioned earlier, not paying electricity bills, cutting back on medical expenses,
01:45just doing whatever they can to really try and meet this increased cost of living.
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