The government has been urged to intervene as Brits were told energy bills could cost the equivalent of two month’s wages.

The TUC called on ministers to consult with trade union and business leaders to devise an urgent response to the crisis following a new report.

Average take home pay after tax will be £2,054 a month in 2023, so two months’ worth will be less than the £4,200 predicted cost of energy bills per household, said the TUC.

The union said the approach should be similar to what happened during the pandemic when unions backed the furlough scheme.

A series of measure have been suggested including stopping the October energy price cap increase, bringing forward the annual increase in the national minimum wage from next April to October, and funding pay rises for public sector workers that keep up with inflation.

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'Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak need to wake up'

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said no one should struggle to get by in one of the richest countries in the world.

He said: “Up and down the country, millions of families are being pushed to the brink by eyewatering energy bills. With prices set to skyrocket even further, it’s time to say enough is enough.

“Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak need to wake up to the size of this crisis. This requires a pandemic-scale intervention.

“Ministers must cancel the catastrophic rise to energy bills this autumn, and to make sure energy remains affordable to everyone, they should bring the energy retail companies into public ownership.

“Ministers should also act to boost pay – as well as Universal Credit, pensions and the minimum wage by bringing forward planned increases to October, and they should fund it through a bigger windfall tax on the obscene profits of energy giants.

Ms O’Grady said that without a long-term plan to prevent a similar living standards emergency, the country will keep “lurching from crisis to crisis”.