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Recent graduates working in the public sector should be aware that a sneaky trick is being played on them by the treasury that leaves them much worse off. Due to the difference in the consumer price index and the retail price index, measurements of inflation, the increase in their student loan repayments is outstripping their salary increases.

The government is offering many public sector employees, including teachers and civil servants, an increase of 2.45 per cent or less this year, but as student loans are charged at around the equivalent of the retail price index (RPI) on 31 March every year, graduates are paying 4.8 per cent until September, the RPI on 31 March last year. From September they are likely to pay 3.8 per cent, still outstripping the increase in their salaries.

The cost of student loans effectively doubled from last September, jumping from 2.4 per cent to 4.8 per cent. Although this does not have an impact on monthly repayments (students have to pay 9 per cent of earnings above £15,000) it increases the total amount of their loan and how long it takes to pay it off.

Young doctors are facing a particularly grim year with a 2.2 per cent salary increase and the right to free accommodation being removed for those who start in August. The BMA’s Medical Students Committee believes that the loss of accommodation provided by hospitals for doctors in their first year on the wards is the equivalent of a pay cut of approximately 20 per cent, about £4,800 a year. The BMA argues that this comes at a time when student debt is at its highest level (£20,000 for medical students) and junior doctors’ salaries are ‘shrinking’, leaving many to find ways to consolidate bills or find other methods topay off their spiralling debts.

The plight of recent graduates working in the public sector may seem like a minor issue to many since it effects such a small percentage of the population. But the reason for that plight should worry everyone.

This government has a history of manipulating and distorting figures to its advantage. Giving public sector pay increases based on the lower consumer price index while charging interest on loans on the higher retail price index is just one example of this. Another is the off balance sheet Private Finance Initiatives that have funded much of the public investment since 1997.

We are currently in the throes of a financial crisis brought on by banks using off balance sheet techniques to manipulate their figures. Over the coming year the government will have to face the financial consequences of their slight of hand tricks and, unfortunately, we are all going to pay the price.

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Another piece of tentative good news, this could become a habit. First Direct, which suspended its mortgage services to new customers six weeks ago, as begun offering them once again.

First Direct stopped offering home loans on 1 April after being deluged by new applicants as the mortgage drought took hold. It was the first bank to withdraw its entire mortgage range to avoid being swamped by new business, but it said it could now handle new applications after clearing its backlog.

First Direct’s parent group, HSBC, has been taking a big share of the market for new mortgages though its Rate matcher offer which has been pitched at people who are trying to move their loans from other lenders, such as the Northern Rock. It offers to match their expiring fixed rates and, according to the bank, has attracted four times the number of enquiries that it would normally receive.

As a result of the credit crunch most lenders have been rationing their lending by withdrawing existing mortgage deals and pushing up the price of the remaining loan packages they have on offer.

Typically, borrowers are now being asked to pay higher interest rates and to put down deposits of at least 10%. This compares with offers of 110% mortgages a little over a year ago.

The reason that these pieces of good news are only tentative is that there are plenty of other, more ominous, signs to go with them.

For example, The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) has warned that the number of property sales this year might fall by 40% as new borrowers find it impossible to raise the money they need to buy a house or flat.

The return of First Direct to the mortgage market and the activities of HSBC demonstrate that first time buyers can still find the financing to buy their own home. The lesson is that buyers will need to save up a certain amount to use as a deposit rather than borrowing the full amount.

If anything this means that the market is once again orientating itself around providing a good service to sensible and reliable borrowers while high risk and imprudent borrowers will, quite rightly, find themselves with nowhere to go.