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Brits are set for a huge hike to the price of replacement boilers as Ed Miliband is accused of piling yet more financial pressure on families. The policy is set to mean it will be around £100 more expensive to update an appliance, as the energy secretary urges homeowners to buy heat pumps instead. The Government is making it so that, for every 92 boilers sold, manufacturers must sell six at least heat pumps. If they do not, firms would be fined £500 per heat pump they failed to flog.

The costs are thought to be then passed onto customers, who would pay higher prices. It has been reported that, as regards the UK's four largest boiler firms, Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Ideal and Baxi, an 8% pump quota does not equate to current demand, and so it is thought that financial penalties are inevitable. Around 1.4million gas boilers are installed every year in Britain.

Mike Foster, head of the Energy Utilities Alliance told The Telegraph that the move "imposes additional and unnecessary costs on the consumer when replacing their boiler".

He added that it "punishes those who can't afford to buy a heat pump, those whose home is not suitable for a heat pump, or those who do not want one".

Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary, warned: "Targets and fines will get more punitive in the years ahead, piling more pressure on families when they can least afford it."

The Government said on Thursday that it is "focused on making sure heat pumps and other low-carbon technologies are the natural consumer choice, in line with our wider approach to pursue the clean energy transition through incentives not penalties".

"This builds on the warm home discount which will cut bills for six million families this winter," ministers added.

Earlier in the month, Ms Coutinho said that instead of insisting that people buy electric cars and heat pumps to meet a Government target, the Tories would "address the underlying challenge for electrification, which is that our electricity is simply too expensive".

The shadow minister added that she would axe the carbon tax on electricity generation, which is "just adding extra costs to our bills".

She also pledged to end subsidies under the renewable obligation subsidy scheme, suggesting that the consumer "cannot afford to pay up to three times the market price for electricity.

"Now those two policies alone will take 20% off electricity bills, not just for six million homes or 100 schools, which is their policy," Ms Coutinho said.

"But for everybody. And what the country chooses to do with that cheaper electricity in my view is up to them."