Sixty per cent of Britons say that they are not willing to pay higher taxes on their energy bills to help reach the Government’s net zero targets, according to a poll.

Some 70 per cent of Britons said they had worried about energy costs over the festive period, with more than 60 per cent saying they did not believe they would benefit from the Government’s green subsidies.

Three in five of the 2,176 questioned said they did not want to pay higher taxes on their bills with a similar proportion saying they had not been given enough of a say on the net zero policies, according to the poll commissioned by campaign group Net Zero Watch.

It comes as Boris Johnson was told that he must intervene to address Britain’s cost of living crisis, with 20 Tory MPs and peers calling on him to scrap taxes on energy bills.

‘Public have not had their say’

Five former ministers are among a group of backbenchers who are calling on Mr Johnson and Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, to step in amid fears that household energy bills could double to £2,000 by April.

Craig Mackinlay, a Tory MP and the chairman of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group, said: “As I’ve been saying for some time, I didn’t become a Conservative to make my constituents colder and poorer. It’s clear, looking at these survey figures, that the British public are not signed up to the Government’s plans.

“They feel they haven’t been consulted or had their say. The majority don’t feel that government grants for air pumps or electric cars are either relevant to them, or more fundamentally needed to nudge them towards unreliable technologies they don’t want. And there is real worry about the ever-increasing costs of energy bills this winter.

“The general public are quite obviously not onside, and we need to be very careful about just whose shoulders are going to be carrying the very considerable costs of net zero.”

Net zero a ‘greater political crisis than Poll Tax’

Steve Baker, another Tory MP and the head of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group’s steering committee, said: “The cost of net zero could deliver a political crisis greater than the Poll Tax, and these figures show that the Government is heading straight for such an eventuality.

“The British people are clearly deeply unhappy about paying higher taxes to help reach net zero targets and feel they haven’t been consulted about the choices the Government are making.

“Grants for air pumps and electric cars are all very well, but how many people can actually afford to pay all the additional costs? Twenty per cent think they will actually benefit.”

Benny Peiser, the director of Net Zero Watch, said: “These figures should ring alarm bells in Number 10. Britain may have hosted Cop26, but the general public feel that they have not been given a real say on the changes the Government are forcing through.

“Millions of families will be struggling to keep their homes warm and their cars running this winter. Fuel prices continue to soar and the burden of these energy costs will fall on the elderly and the low paid at a time when people are already finding things tough.”