On her broadcast round yesterday morning, the Prime Minister said that, thanks to the government intervention, “people across this country are not facing energy bills of more than £2,500” this year. Not only is this downright wrong, it’s wildly dangerous.

For the avoidance of any doubt, there is no £2,500 cap on energy bills.

Instead, from 1st October the unit rate for every kWh of energy you use is capped. This means you will be charged 34p per kWh of electricity you use, and 10.3p per kWh of gas you use. This means the AVERAGE household in the UK will spend around £2,500 on energy bills per year.

But this obviously means that many households will also be both above (and in some cases below) this average amount.

By saying that households won’t pay more than £2,500 a year for energy bills, Liz Truss either doesn’t understand her own energy policy, or is misleading the public – something that could have dire consequences.

Pensioners and low-income households across the country will have heard her say this (she said it 4 or 5 times before adding the caveat that it was for average household use) and will think they can keep their heating on all winter and be protected by the £2,500 cap.

Now that really IS a disgrace. What will happen to these households when they receive their energy bills and they’re significantly more than this? Will the PM accept responsibility for misleading them?

The key thing to remember is that – even with the government intervention – prices are still 4x higher for gas and 3x higher for electricity than they were 18 months ago. Households will feel the pain of that, particularly when the cost of living is increasing so dramatically.

There are many individuals and organisations trying to inform the public of these issues (Martin Lewis and National Energy Action to name a couple) but what we really need is a mass public education campaign so everybody knows where they stand on one of the biggest issues of the day.

Please share this post with anybody you think would benefit from the clarification that the energy price cap is not in fact… a cap. Also remember to take a meter reading and submit it to your energy supplier today to make sure your account is up to date!