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The Met Office issued a severe weather warning for London, south-east England and eastern England, as up to 2cm of snow settled the length of Britain from Kent to Scotland.

“It’s a bitterly cold morning,” said Dan Adamson, a forecaster for MeteoGroup. “It’s been a few years since it’s been as cold as this.”

A wave of rain, sleet and snow moved down the UK and turned to ice in many places as temperatures dropped overnight.

Britain has already experienced arctic in the last week, with Benson in Oxfordshire reaching minus 9C on Saturday night, and Paul Simons, weather expert for The Times, predicts that tonight will feel even colder than the last few days, with temperatures plunging as low as minus 10C.

So far Scotland has borne the brunt of the cold weather, with the Highlands recording temperatures as low as minus 13C one night last week, but Met Office forecasts suggest that England and Wales are about to suffer the worst temperatures, with a similar freeze on Wednesday night across Wales and southern England. Even during the day, temperatures are unlikely to rise above 0C in many places.

Mr Simons said: “With such thick frost expected this week it could look like snow first thing in the morning. And because conditions are also calm, with hardly a whiff of a breeze, there will be plenty of dense freezing fog hanging around. This can produce the strange sight of ice crystals falling out of the air and settling on the ground, which can look like snow has fallen.”

The deep freeze has already prompted Severn Trent water company to appeal for its eight million customers across the Midlands and Wales to protect their water systems, after reports that pipes were freezing and cracking even with customers putting their heating on full blast.

The chilly conditions have also seen one of England’s largest lakes freeze over and police warned today that it is not safe for children to play on the fragile natural ice rink.

School children have been seen trying to smash holes with boulders as they play on the ice on Derwentwater in the Lake District.

Two young children were seen on Saturday, accompanied by their parents, playing on the ice 50ft from the shore, and others have been spotted on bays and inlets covered with ice.

Garry Armstrong, from Cumbria Police, said: “This is a very dangerous situation and people are putting their lives and potentially the lives of others in real danger.

“There is no uniformity in the formation of the ice and it can become thin very quickly. It may appear to be suitable to walk on but you cannot see or gauge the depth of the ice that has formed.

“If someone does happen to fall under the ice with the temperatures we are experiencing the consequences could be fatal.”

The current cold snap is set to continue until the weekend when milder weather may finally arrive.