Letter to the PM: Three demands to help victims of cost of living crisis

Prime Minister, we need urgent help.

As Liz Truss today (September 6) prepares to meet the Queen at Balmoral after securing the keys to Number 10, we have this stark message for her on behalf of everyone in Bristol.

We need help - now - to prevent a cost-of-living catastrophe in our city.

Businesses will fold, many people will go cold, hungry or both and some will die unless you, Ms Truss, take radical action immediately.

Spiralling energy prices are already hitting the poorest in Bristol hardest. It is a scandal that prepayment meters, used by many on low incomes, come with higher energy costs under the price cap. It can’t be right that someone on a prepayment meter is charged more than anyone else to boil a kettle or put on the heating.

We are joining forces with our sister titles in cities up and down the UK to demand urgent help for both households and businesses.

On launching in October last year we started a campaign called Level Up Bristol, calling for an end to inequality in Bristol, after revealing 13 per cent of those in the most deprived areas in our city experienced moderate to severe ‘food insecurity’.

Public health data also showed that in Hartcliffe and Withywood nearly half (45 per cent) of children lived in poverty - an estimated 2,105 children.

We fear that since the data collection from 2019/20, the situation has worsened, particularly in the most deprived areas of the city.

In June, we reported on figures from the Trussell Trust that the charity handed out almost 27,000 emergency food parcels in Bristol in the first three months of this year, almost 60% up from the same period two years ago.

While just last week restaurants in the city issued a warning amid rising energy prices.

We are calling on Liz Truss to take immediate action, specifically:

• To stop the cost of energy from going above double the levels seen last winter, for both households and businesses;

• To help those on prepayment meters so they are no longer facing higher energy prices; and

• To tell energy companies that they cannot cut off the supply to any homes this winter if people fall behind on their bills.