Britain stands on the brink of a national calamity.
This Friday energy firms will be given the green light to raise bills to £3,500 a year. By January the average household could be paying as much as £6,000 a year.
Families are already going without food because of the cost of living crisis. The elderly are already using candles to save electricity and desperate households are already rationing hot water and turning off electric appliances.
If the situation is dire now, it will be a catastrophe if prices are allowed to rise still further.
Millions more families will be pushed into economic hardship. More pensioners will die from the cold. Thousands of small firms face going under.
For the Government to stand on the sidelines as this disaster unfolds is unforgivable.
At the moment people are working all the hours they can, many taking on second or third jobs, and they still cannot cover the cost of their energy bills.
How do the Tories expect them to cope when bills rise to £500 a month?
The country cannot afford to wait for a new Prime Minister to be in place.
Action is needed now.
If we do not want people to die from cold, we need to freeze energy bills, cut VAT and provide more support to those on welfare, pensions and low incomes.
These are times of emergency and we need emergency measures.
