The spiralling cost of living is hitting middle-class wallets harder than all other sectors of society, analysis by The Times suggests, with services such as nannies, public school fees, private healthcare and house cleaners rising on average at more than twice the official rate of inflation.

A ground-breaking study from this paper two years ago showed that so-called “middle class inflation” was running far ahead of public perception. The latest figures, taken from official statistics and bodies such as the Independent Schools Council, show that rises in such services have accelerated as food and energy bills have shot ahead for everyone.

The consumer price index (CPI), the measure favoured by Alistair Darling, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, this week showed a year-on-year rise of 3.3 per cent. But this is flattered by falling prices for footwear and clothing. Meanwhile costs in the services sector, which is disproportionately used by middle class professional parents, both of whom are likely to be working, are still soaring. The original study in The Times study in August 2006 showed that the cost of private school fees was rising by 5.7 per cent a year. The latest figures from the ISC show that fees are still rising at this rate.

But the cost of employing a nanny in Central London is accelerating rapidly. Two years ago salaries were going up by 4 per cent each year. The latest figure, gained from Nannytax.co.uk, was 15.2 per cent. The cost of employing a cleaner, which is covered in the alternative retail prices index (RPI) under domestic services, is also accelerating. Against an annual rise of 4.6 per cent two years ago, wages are now up 4.9 per cent a year.

What is hitting middle class professionals hardest is the compound effect of year-on-year rises at twice the official inflation rate, at a time when their salaries, if they are rising at all, are probably pegged to that rate. As a consequence, a 6 per cent rise in school fees, for example, compounded over the eight years since the start of the decade, means they have actually risen by 60 per cent over that period.

Meanwhile the middle classes are not immune from the rises in costs that are hitting the population as a whole. Two years ago annual food price inflation was a relatively benign 3.2 per cent, while the cost of alcoholic drinks was actually declining slightly. The latest CPI shows food costs rising by 8.7 per cent annually, while alcohol is ahead by 5.4 per cent.

The CPI is calculated by monitoring a range of goods and services and giving each a weighting according to their relative importance in an average household’s spending. So offset against higher food and drink costs, and so bringing the average down to the reported 3.3 per cent, are relative falls in the cost of clothes, shoes and electrical equipment such as TVs and DVD players.

The five categories disproportionately used by the professional middle classes, however, are social protection, which takes in nursery fees, playgroups and retirement homes, health insurance such as that provided by BUPA, domestic services, private school fees and nannies’ salaries.

Analysis by The Times suggests that this “middle class basket” has risen in cost over the past year by 7.5 per cent, more than twice the rate of inflation as measured by the Treasury.

Tom Harris, the Transport Minister, caused an uproar earlier this week by telling families to “stop being so bloody miserable”. He meant that living standards over the past few decades had improved so dramatically that a temporary dip might not be the catastrophe it appears.

But for many Times readers, gingerly opening the letter informing them of next year’s school fees and wondering why the nanny seems so much better off than they are, everything is relative. And the merlot they drink to calm their shattered nerves is not getting any cheaper either.

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