Scarborough & Whitby MP Sir Robert Goodwill says new PM Liz Truss needs to urgently address Cost of Living crisis

Reacting to Monday lunchtime’s announcement that Liz Truss is the new Prime Minister, Mr Goodwill said: “Liz has now got the opportunity over the next two years, between now and the next general election, and there are so many important issues in her in-tray that urgently need to be addressed.

"Just when we thought we had got Brexit done and got through the pandemic and the war in Europe, we now have issues which are the knock-on effects of the Ukraine situation – the energy crisis and food supply.

Talking about what she could offer as PM, Mr Goodwill said Ms Truss was the longest-serving Cabinet member who had served in a number of departments, including DEFRA – but now she faces helping people through the Cost of Living crisis.

He said one of the things her Tory leadership race rival Rishi Sunak had stressed he was keen to do was to help people most in need, talking of tax cuts across the board, and Mr Goodwill said he would be interested to see how Ms Truss tackles the Cost of Living crisis when she gets to work as the country’s leader.

"People who don’t have money left at the end of the month will be worst his and don’t have discretionary things they can cut back on like holidays and going out for meals,” he said.

"For some of those families, they really don’t know how they are going to make ends meet.”

Mr Goodwill said there was the assumption that people would use the same of amount of energy this winter as they did last winter.

He said people would be very conscious of putting the heating on, turning it off in rooms they don’t use regularly and could save 25% on their bills just by being prudent.

One tip he had was for people watching TV in the front room on an evening, with the heating on, could simply turn it off and watch TV in bed instead.

“But still there will be people who have difficulty and I’m hoping the Government will keep on producing ways to help people.

"It’s important that we can deploy our resources, we do make sure those most in need don’t have trouble making ends meet,” he said.

Mr Goodwill said pubs and restaurants on the coast could also be hit hard – and was aware that some businesses’ energy bills will triple.

"People in hospitality will think ‘is it worth opening Monday might’ and they’re getting fewer for meals, and will think very carefully before they open.”

He said the country needs to do more to divert energy from its own sources – and he included fracking in that, as well as wind and nuclear energy.

“That's not short-term, but we should really look at how we can become more self-sufficient.

"France produces 99% of its electricity from nuclear power.”

He added that the cost of living crisis was not an area where the Labour Party had offering any solutions, other than criticising the Government for what was happening.