Pints of beer, Marks and Spencer's ready meals and flights to continental Europe are among the things that consumers are cutting back on as they tighten household budgets.

Yesterday, the latest mobile phone joined a growing list of products that the British consumer is learning to live without. Vodafone, the world's largest mobile phone operator, said that the number of customers coming through its doors was slowing in the UK as shoppers choose to put up with old handsets rather than splashing out on new models.