“I understand people’s anxiety and concern about energy bills.”

“Look,” says chancellor Rishi Sunak (he often starts sentences with ‘look’ when he’s being interviewed). “I understand people’s anxiety and concern about energy bills.” For a former hedge fund manager worth hundreds of millions who is married to a woman worth literally billions you have to admire either his levels of empathy or chutzpah, depending on your point of view. I fear that despite his popularity with voters achieved I suspect for handing out free money at the peak of the pandemic it is most definitely the latter.

Speaking to the Mail on Sunday, Sunak didn’t seem to be understanding “people’s anxiety and concern about energy bills”. “Let’s not be spending any more money — let’s make sure the money we’re spending is spent really well,” he wrote, which is another way of saying I’m going to do fuck all about it.

In my cosy little world, we’ve managed okay but we know a change is coming. Our utility bills have already rocketed and that’s nothing compared to what’s coming in a few weeks and again in the autumn. Soon, our gas bill will increase by 54% and by the autumn we’ll be paying circa £300 a month. For us, this is not a trifling sum, as it might be to – ooh, let me think, oh yes – grinning Rishi Sunak and we are already planning for the future. Richard Branson’s Virgin Media will be first for the chop, as will excesses on the weekly shopping and our leisure activities. We’ll be fine, we won’t go under but we will feel the pinch, albeit in ways that won’t see us going without. Millions, I fear, will not be so lucky unless Dishy Rishi acts.

But it’s not just me saying this. How about the brilliant Money Saving Expert, Martin Lewis: “I’m the Money Saving Expert. I’m out of tools to help people. Money management will not solve this. We need political intervention.” That’s pretty unequivocal. Lewis is in the business of money management but when the money is gone, there’s nothing else he can do. Mr Sunak – and here I put on my Loyd Grossman voice – it’s over to you.

Our ambitious chancellor, who so desperately wants Boris Johnson’s job, has plenty to think about because it won’t just be the massive increases in energy prices that will see people go under. Think about this lot:

• Petrol is becoming ever more expensive. Could it reach £2 a litre soon?
• National Insurance is being increased in April – effectively an 11% tax rise for working people
• Personal allowances are being frozen, which will mean a real terms tax rise for working people
• Inflation, as measured by the CPI is expected to reach 8% soon, which will be nearer 11% according to the old measure the RPI. Some experts say inflation could rise much higher
• Wages will not be rising at anything like inflation levels, if they rise at all

When I drove through town in Bristol in the early evening last Saturday, there were no indications of a cost of living crisis. Not only were bars and clubs packed, many had long queues outside. I’m told the place was bustling all evening. Perhaps, there are sufficient people whose standard of living can withstand the coming squeeze who will enable the leisure industry to survive but I’m not convinced. A lifetime of working for the DWP (in all its guises) and later the third sector has given me the knowledge and understanding of the lives of others I might not otherwise have met. I came across numerous people who lived in shabby, damp, sometimes squalid accommodation, people who were already having to choose between heating and eating. People at the bottom of society’s food chain. There will be plenty more like them this summer and autumn.

For us, it’s a case of getting ready for the coming squeeze. Of acting before things begin to get tight, To make long term decisions with regard to major expenditure, some of which will be very difficult. And yet, barring a catastrophe, we should still be among the lucky ones.

When Sunak says, “I understand people’s anxiety and concern about energy bills,” he’d better mean it and he’d better understand that voters will remember if a man with more money than God does nothing to protect them. Poverty brings illness and death and that is the challenge Sunak, his government and all of society faces. We know that Sunak is a master of image projection. It would be helpful if there was more substance to him than that. Politically at least he will pay a terrible price if he is an empty, grinning shell. And he’ll richly deserve to.

Photo: Sunak’s house.