Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak meet members at Tory leadership hustings in Darlington – as it happened

Candidates to replace Boris Johnson take questions amid reports of emergency planning for winter blackouts

Liz Truss, the frontrunner in the Tory leadership contest, has hit back at claims from the Rishi Sunak camp that her economic plans would amount to an electoral suicide note" for the Tories because they would not protect people from soaring energy bills. (See 9.13am.) Speaking on a visit to Reliance Precision Ltd, a defence company in Huddersfield, she insisted that her approach would help people. Here are the main points she made.

My campaign is all about growing the British economy ... What I care about is Britain being successful. I don't agree with these portents of doom. I don't agree with this declinist talk.

I believe our country's best days are ahead of us. What I'm going to do, if selected as prime minister, is keep taxes low, get the economy growing, unleash the potential right across Britain. That's what I'm about.

What I'm doing is making sure people are paying less taxes and also having a temporary moratorium on the green energy levy to save people money on their fuel bills.

I'm not going to write the budget in advance. We'll see what the situation is like in the autumn. But I'm committed to making sure people are supported and I'm committed to growing the economy.

What I don't believe in is taxing people to the highest level in 70 years, and then giving them their own money back.

We are Conservatives, we believe in low taxes. What I'm not going to do is announce the next budget in advance - of course we'll need to deal with the circumstances as they arise - but my fundamental principle is that people should keep more of their own money.

The latest projections of annual energy bills exceeding 4,200 from January is the latest in a series of terrifying warnings over the past week, from the Bank of England and others. Families on low incomes cannot afford these eye watering sums and as a nation we can't afford to ignore an impending disaster.

Both candidates to be prime minister must now recognise the extraordinarily fast-changing situation and act to protect the hardest hit from the coming emergency.