Another week and more grim milestones as this crisis of soaring costs and plummeting living standards continues to unfold before us. 

Yesterday, it emerged that inflation is set to hit almost 19% in the coming months, a 50 year high. Described by one major bank as “entering the stratosphere”, that’s nine times the target set by the Bank of England.

By Friday, Ofgem is expected to have confirmed that the energy price cap will rise in October from £1971 to £3500, while one major supermarket chain has said shoppers are already facing a monthly hit of £160 on their disposable incomes.

At the time of writing Scotland’s First Minister is set to chair a summit of energy companies, consumer groups and the third sector about what can be done to lessen the impact of these off-the-scale price hikes. 

While struggling households are the obvious focus, businesses and public bodies are also being squeezed by energy costs like never before and there may well be severe consequences for the economy and services in the near future which we also need to prepare for. 

I only hope with the powers, resources and partnerships we have here in Scotland that those taking part in this summit find common cause and are able to put practical measures in place to head off some of the dire consequences of this crisis.

Here in Glasgow, the council is working with partners in the third and housing sectors to put in place a city-wide plan to use our network of assets – from libraries to community centres to school canteens – to make welcoming places available to those in need during the winter months. We should be clear, “warm banks”, as they have been called, are not a solution, they are a sticking plaster at best. But in the absence of concerted action to help people afford to heat and feed themselves in their own homes, we have no choice but to support people during this emergency as best we can.

It is, of course, the UK Government who could act tomorrow to alleviate hardship for tens of millions of people. 

They have the borrowing and regulatory powers and the influence over the energy producers and retailers to make the interventions that are needed right now. 

Meanwhile, as only 160,000 or so Tory party members prepare to install the next Prime

Minister, the rest of us are left asking: just who exactly is in charge here?

The entire Tory government has been posted missing in action. They have left the UK drifting perilously closer to a calamity. Writing in a recent Glasgow Times column, I said the scale of the intervention needed by the UK Government to deal with the cost-of-living crisis was on a par with that demanded by the pandemic. Many others have said similar. 

The response from the UK Government to this escalating crisis isn’t just inadequate. 

It’s practically non-existent. I genuinely fear that while Liz Truss, who we can say with some certainty will be the next PM, continues to peddle Thatcherite nostalgia, the consequences for Glaswegians of her inaction may not be dissimilar to that experienced in the early 1980s – a breakdown of social cohesion with severe and lasting consequences for the health and wellbeing of this city. 

We in the SNP make no secret of our view that, piled on top of 12 years of austerity and then Brexit, this crisis adds an urgency to the people of Scotland being given an alternative to misrule and contempt from Westminster. We also don’t shirk the big decisions here in Scotland to improve the lives of our citizens. 

From the Scottish Child Payment to pushing for an enhanced pay offer for local government workers, we will use the resources we have to improve the lives of our citizens, especially the most vulnerable.

But right now, those with the powers to prevent a calamity must do so. And that is the Westminster government. The consequences of their failure to do so are too grave to consider.