Reserve Bank of Australia governor Philip Lowe to face senate estimates as ninth rate rise takes its toll

"How could he not see that?" asked Joe Penders, a Canberra single dad of two, questioning why Dr Lowe could not have anticipated what was ahead.

Nine consecutive cash rate rises since May have meant blow after blow for households, the ones who feel the daily pinch of rising inflation.

While on a variable rate last year, Mr Penders said his mortgage repayments were "continually going up".

In recent weeks he has refinanced his home loan, switching from a variable rate to a fixed one.

It offers some peace of mind, Mr Penders said, but day-to-day costs still seem to grow. He said a grocery shop that once cost him $100 is now $170.

"It's nearly doubled," he said.

"I take public transport when I can so I'm not paying for petrol and not paying for parking. You just have to limit yourself, everything you do."

In November, Dr Lowe apologised to borrowers who listened to the Reserve Bank's advice that it would not raise the cash rate until 2024.

The guidance, issued in February 2021, stated the central bank would not raise the cash rate until actual inflation was within the 2 to 3 per cent target, which it did not expect "until 2024 at the earliest".

Mr Penders said Dr Lowe "should have put a warning out to people" sooner that the cash rate was going to rise.

"I've been around long enough to know that these things happen but I don't understand, how could he not see that?" he said.

"I know there's factors which are outside his control, the war in Ukraine and so on. But he should have at least hinted that things could change and people would have slowed down with borrowing.

"He's got to be held accountable for it - it's his job, he's the boss."

Mr Penders isn't new to home ownership, but said he empathises with those who are.

"Personally, it doesn't bother me because I've been through this three or four times - the rates going up and down, up and down over the years," he said.

"But younger people, for the last 10 years the rates have stayed low so I think it would have caught a lot of people out and that's not good for anybody."

Nearly a quarter of Australian mortgage holders (23.9 per cent) are now considered "at risk" of mortgage stress, the highest rate since 2013, January data from Roy Morgan revealed.

Mortgage holders are considered "at risk" if their repayments are greater than a certain percentage of household income depending on their earnings and spending.

The portion of mortgage holders now considered "extremely at risk" - when their interest alone is more than a certain proportion of income - is 15 per cent.

The Reserve Bank signaled in its February statement more rate rises were expected in the months ahead as it seeks to return inflation to the target range of 2 to 3 per cent.

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For Mr Penders, that means luxuries, such as holidays, are off the cards.

"I'm on an average wage, I'm not on big money so I just can't afford those luxuries," he said.

He said having direct debits for household bills helped to keep track of expenses.

"You just have to plan ahead," he said.

"I just try and ensure that there's enough left over for a treat for [the kids] because they deserve something."

Reserve Bank of Australia governor Philip Lowe will come under intense questioning when he appears before a parliamentary hearing amid growing expectations official interest rates will reach 4.1 per cent by mid-year.

As anger mounts about the impact of rising borrowing costs, Dr Lowe is set to be grilled by the Senate Economic Legislation Committee on the RBA's decision to hike rates last week and his warning of the likelihood or more increases to come.

The hearing comes a day after National Australia Bank revised its monetary policy forecasts and joined the financial markets and others such as Deutsche Bank predicting three more rate rises this year.

The outlook has government MPs worried.

Senior ministers including Treasurer Jim Chalmers have been careful not to impinge on the independence of the Reserve Bank but Assistant Treasurer Stephen Jones said yesterday the government was "concerned that further increases are going to put pressure on households and businesses that are already doing it tough".

Liberal senator Andrew Bragg, who is deputy chair of the Economic Legislation Committee, said he would ask Dr Lowe about the impact of remarks made by Mr Jones last week when he expressed the hope that "if this is not the last it's near the last of the rate increases".

Senator Bragg said it was "not in our interests" to make Dr Lowe a scapegoat for higher rates and he would instead ask the RBA about what more the government should be doing to help ease inflation.

"The reality is that Canberra has created a spending problem and right now Labor is in government so they have to fix it," he said.

But fellow committee member, Greens treasury spokesman Nick McKim, accused the RBA of trying to "drive Australia into a recession".

The senator said higher interest rates was "smashing the lives [of renters and mortgage holders] for something that they are not responsible for causing".

The mood among consumers has plunged following last week's interest rate hike and warnings from Dr Lowe of more to come.

The Westpac-Melbourne Institute Consumer Sentiment Index fell almost 7 per cent to 78.5 points, and dropped to 74.5 points among those surveyed after the RBA rate decision - even lower than when the pandemic first hit in early 2020 and the weakest reading since the depths of the 1990s recession.

Westpac senior economist Matthew Hassan said high inflation and rising interest rates were clearly weighing heavily on households.

Asked about the state of family finances compared with a year earlier, sentiment among those surveyed fell to just 62.1 points, and among those with a mortgage it plummeted to just 55.4 points, which Mr Hassan said were among the bleakest responses to this question in the history of the survey, which began in the mid-1970s.

Households were almost as downbeat about the outlook for their finances in the year ahead, with that reading dropping 7.7 per cent to 75.1 points and the index measuring attitudes to the purchase of a major household items fell 78 points - far below the long-term average of 126 points.

Mr Hassan said the results were "a clear warning that consumers are poised to cut back sharply on spending".

Families were already pulling back on purchases late last year, according to card and bank transaction data analysed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Though spending on goods and services increased in December, the rate of growth slowed dramatically. After peaking at 29.2 per cent in August, the annual pace of expenditure slowed to 11.2 per cent and was driven largely by spending on services.

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