Edinburgh energy bills: Fuel poverty protesters to stage rally outside UK Government's Queen Elizabeth House

Demonstrators will gather outside the UK Government’s Edinburgh headquarters on Saturday note-0 to warn that Prime Minister Liz Truss’s promise to offset the impact of soaring energy bills does not go far enough.

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They say the £2,500 price cap will still leave millions of people across the country in fuel poverty and unable to pay their bills.

The protesters will gather for a rally at noon outside Queen Elizabeth House on Sibbald Walk, off New Street, to insist that extra help is needed to rescue people who can’t make ends meet because of the sky-high costs.

Colin Fox, spokesman for the Edinburgh End Fuel Poverty Coalition, which is organising the event, said the Prime Minister had suggested everyone must endure the pain which rising energy bills bring.

But he said: “The pain, as she calls it, is not being suffered equally. Her promise to freeze household energy bills for two years does not protect those already going without the gas and electricity they need.

“As National Energy Action chief executive Adam Scorer has pointed out, the poorest families have already been hit hard by earlier price rises. The October freeze still leaves them deep in trouble. NEA estimates there are 6.7 million households across the UK, one million in Scotland, trapped in fuel poverty.

“The £2,500 ‘price cap’ is not as much help to those already in fuel poverty – defined as paying 10 per cent of your income, once housing costs are deducted, on this single bill – and do not have £2,500.

Edinburgh fuel campaigners are calling for Liz Truss to do more to help

“Those earning less than £27,000 a year are left in fuel poverty even after Liz Truss’s intervention. Our coalition is calling on the Government to provide further financial assistance to those 6.7m families and in the longer run to diversify away from expensive and polluting fossil fuels, devote more money to energy efficiency initiatives, equalise prices for those using ‘unregulated fuels’ like heating oil or wood and to return the energy supply industry to public hands.”

Speakers at the rally will include Colin Fox, East Lothian Alba MP Kenny McAskill, Mick Hogg of the RMT union, Jane Loftus from the CWU union, Fraser Scott of Energy Action Scotland and Natalie Reid from the Scottish Socialist Party.