IMPOVERISHED households in rural Scotland have been “lumbered with a rural premium” during the cost-of-greed crisis, MPs warn.

Westminister’s Scottish affairs committee has challenged both UK and Scottish governments to act, after their investigations uncovered evidence that rural communities routinely paid more for life’s basics such as energy, food and transport than their counterparts in urban Scotland.

Noting that the highest rates of fuel poverty in Scotland were found in the Western Isles, Highlands, and Argyll and Bute, its report concluded that government “energy support provided was not sufficiently rural-proofed — it did not account for additional costs required for many households in rural Scotland.”