Duty rise set to bring fuel tax to 71% in 2 weeks

FUEL IS NOT TAXED AT 71% IT IS NEARER 300%

if a litre cost 98p and 66p of that is tax then actual cost is 32p plus tax at 306% equals 97.9p

Oil hit $60 a barrel today and many analysts predict a continued rise. This year will see 3 duty increases totalling 6.5p a litre. This of course includes the increase to counteract the VAT cut (motorists are fair game). When VAT is returned to 17.5% or more? that amounts to a 2.5p duty increase and is the most stealthy of stealth taxes. Things are made worse by the weak pound and all this could mean pump prices return to the 2008 levels this year. What a way to hit the poor hardest when instead they should be raising income tax for middle earners who CAN afford it!
The only way to stop this is protest and it you want an incentive fuel is 20% more expensive on average than at the time of the 2000 protests. Or might I suggest emigrating to Venezuela where fuel is 3.5p a litre and you never need heating!

Just an update to the blog I did the other week before the budget. I had a reply from my MP (Tim Farron, Lib Dem) who in essence was not prepared to oppose the government on this one, in line with Lib Dem strategy. So much for your local MP supporting you.

I cant believe Gordon Browns greed, he will tax fuel to the point where people will be forced off the road simply because we wont be able to afford to put fuel in our tanks. If people cant put fuel in tanks then they will stop driving and therefore stop taxing their cars and ultimately stop buying cars. I think its outrageous that we have to pay 71% fuel tax, then road fund licence and tax when you buy a car. I fully understand that we need to contribute to road building and maintenance and fully support this, but every time I look at the roads in my area, I only see patch repair and very rarely a new surface, so where does this money go?
So my message to Gordon Brown to help him with his election pledges would be give the populus something back, like a reduction in fuel tax to help the public and business alike.
Thanks for listening.
Lawrence Ringshaw.

i live in cleethorpes on travelling around north yorkshire i put diesel in at tescos york at 100.9 on way home called at tesco in scunthorpe diesel 100.9.I always fill up at tesco in cleethorpes £100.00 per week and the price has been 102.9.When i phoned tesco to complain they didnot want to know.Cleethorpes from refinery 11miles,Scunthorpe from refinery 22miles,York 60 miles from refinery,because only limited fuel stations in Cleethorpes tesco think they can rip us off .applying for a fuel card to save money

Manifestos made by Politicians? They are lies to get elected for the MPs' gravy train.

Promises made by Politicians? They are lies to get short-term gain. You don't REALLY think they have the public good at heart?

It is proven we are governed by liars, (45 minutes.) cheats and thieves and how much can I get out of the system for ME.

What wonderful role models those who rule the country are. What respect we hold them in.

Holy Shvt! A whole page (75) of suckers propagandized to base their happiness on car ownership and operation! Somewhere out there an advertiser is giving himself an A+ grade at deception! The Soviets suffered the same syndrome, and the Americans die in debt, and drowned in pollution for it! Annual model changes was their Waterloo! Crack cocaine is more merciful, its faster! Give the car up, go to the buses and rail for a layed back lifestyle, and if that doesn't help, take Prozac, and drink home brew, but think for yourself, and don't be so easy! Smoking pot might help you get by this rough spot, but for god's sake don't ever let the advertisers control you! If God meant us to have motor cars we would be born with garages! I asked my company to pay for my car to get to work, and since they are located down a country road I damn near got away with the truth! If somebody wants you to be somewhere at a certain time, they should pay, not you! The proletariat has played victim to the "cost of transportation" farce long enough! China invites its 85 cent U.S. and hour laboring peasant women to live at the factory, sleeping mats, slot toilets, company cafeteria, clothing in form of company uniforms and all included, as well as paying train fare back home when time to go! Our system makes us pay through the nose for everything - no fair, no fare!

Maybe if the goverment stopped all these multi million pound aids to china, taxed people who earn over £50k a year up to around 20%, put a cap on profits by the oil companies and just a had a review of the finances and then we could see the real picture, oh... and stop bailing out banks, reading a report in the times the other week did you know that all those billions wasted could have given us 3 months of no fuel duty and working tax.... interesting! so i could have been £90 better off and paying 30-35p a litre for my fuel....

The thing is... if the goverment reversed and took fuel duty off the inflation will go down, prices will fall, public transport will find itself making more profit = better service, people will have more money in hand, for days out etc and the country would be out of reccesion on no time!

At this moment in time its going to get worse, and it will reach a point where it will all kick in! as i agree with some posts.. we need french style protests as they are effective and cause disruption! Imagine thousands of motorists doing a go slow on the M25 M1 M62 etc blocking refineries ports etc. the goverment would have to act Its time do something! We should be paying 42p a litre NOT £1.02 -- and what have the goverment got planned for when oil runs out? air tax?

Once again our "government" shows appalling and conscious insensitivity to the needs of industries and transport that are diesel-dependent! AND at a time when, in many cases, they deserve all the support and encouragement available simply to exist, continue to function and provide employment.

Tax has three letters in it, which this government love. Well how do they like the sound of BNP? I would never have dreamt of voting BNP thinking they would be lying toe rags in it to tax us to the hilt to feather their own nest and to hell with everybody. Well, as far as I'm concerned thats what we've got in the Labour government. 10p a gallon wouldn't be so bad if it was all going on the roads and the transport system. I only live 6.5 miles from work which takes me about 15 to 20 minutes, to catch 2 buses would take at least 90 minutes. Perhaps if I could claim for a second home next to my work i wouldn't have anything to moan about!!!

As usual the motorist suffering again with high fuel prices. As the government is short of money, I suggest that they halve MP,s Salary, cancel all allowances and when they are required to be in london they are booked into one of the ,Travelodge, premier hotels etc which if booked well in advance only charge around £29.00 p.er night the rooms are more than adequate for an MP

Here we go again, does the government not realise that we are in a recession

2.5% of VAT, did anyone notice, should have been more like 10%

Who do the government work for, us, i don't think so. All they are doing is lining their own pockets and forgetting who's best interests they should be looking after

Unfortunately the motorist is an easy target when priorities are forced to change by unforseen circumstances. The bank buy-out and the associated slide was one of these points, and probably not the last. The motorist takes it in the bread basket again!

I will probably be Mr Unpopular here, but I for one don't object to the increases. When diesel peaked at around £1.30 my commute was much faster. Now I am not after increases to make my commute easier but this does demonstrate that there are many journeys being made unnecessarily - after all they stopped when prices climbed sufficiently high. I know of people whose employer has stopped paying for private fuel and they have now reviewed their car usage considerably. I know of many people who drive half a mile to take their children to school. All of this proves that there are a lot of unnecessary journeys being made - and therefore a lot of damage to the environment.

Perhaps we do need to build in some relief for the hauliers, but I don't think we need to at the current prices. Might make sense to review this though.

Oh no - fuel up again. Promises, promises......

The Prime Minister has pledged to help us through this recession so how does another rise in fuel duty help us??

What do you expect, were all being brain washed into thinking were being taxed to save the world with the green movement but, the government does nothing to make alternative transport cheaper or even affordable when compared with the humble car. Public transport is a disgrace in this country and until the number of fat cats in power are reduced and the number of useless management roles in the public sector brought to a sensible level, then we will all pay for their lifestyle and fantastic final salary pension's.

Bring on the revolution!

This act just proves what a bunch of unmitigated liars this government is and led by an unelected egotistical idiot. Remember those words Education, Education, Education?
They have become Failure, failure, failure and spin, spin, spin but never truth and honesty.

absolutely disgusting-seems the car driver is treated very badly-like criminals.Just easy targets.Car is essential to many people heavy shopping etc.How would I get big bag compost from garden centre to home?& if you have a dog,may or may not be allowed on bus(up to driver apparently)

I do 5000miles a year, thats 750 litres, which means this rise will cost me £15. That's Ok with me, all I have to do is cycle 4 miles a week instead of driving and I will be in profit.

well in my opinion although its discusting that the price,s have risen again, it wont make any differance who is in power, as they are all the same, they dont care about joe public only about what they want as we never get a say at all!!

why are petrol prices so different at different total garages, surely they should all be the same!!

As usual it is the working man who has to bear the brunt of the governments incompetence, so we the motorists are going to cover the billions given to the banks who managed to ruin our economy and on another note not entirely about fuel, i have heard that motorists and transport firms are going to be hit very hard with fines for any infringements of the law.

I have just paid 105.9p / litre for diesel- a few days ago it was 99.9p. Petrol has increased a similar percentage. As several correspondents have pointed out, fuel costs have a direct impact on the cost of living, and in this difficult worldwide economic climate I would have thought governments would take REDUCING fuel costs as a priority. As a nation we need to insist on this to OUR government.

Gordon Brown is happy to borrow money to give Trillions to the banks who lend it back to us at extortionate rates and charge ridiculous admin and default fee's whenever we get in trouble. Our Government is happy to award themselves billions of pounds in the form of "expenses." Dishonest non-working people (I don't mean everyone, just the large number of people that don't work because they can't be bothered) are happy to claim billions in benefits. And who pays for all of this? We do. This is yet another tax on people such as myself who have to drive for an hour each day in order to get to work because local work cannot be found. Once again the entire nation is happy to leech of hard working people by once again increasing travel costs and passing the cost onto the people that are REALLY keeping the country running - the people still bothering to go to work each day.

As a driving instructor.the price of fuel is my biggest out lay. what I would like to know how we got a PM when there was no vote by the public, in other words he got in by default. If Brown got PM by default then he will have all he needs to increase fuel by default.

Gordon Browns action belittle his word.Yet another Lying PM. Petrol price hikes is just another example of this. We the people have let them have their way for tooo long. How can they justify the price at the pump.credit crunch obviously means nothing to their bulging pockets. I am scunnered.Heather

I am currently in New Zealand for a month but am returning in a week to UK and am disgusted to hear petrol has risen again. I am reading in the papers that infact oil has gone down in price. I think we as a nation should not buy on a weekend for as long as it takes to stop the rises and profiteering.

I accept that Gordon Brown had delayed the 2 pence tax increase on fuel until April 2009 but why have all the oil companies put their 2 pence (or more) as well? I call it thieving! Buy your petrol/diesel from supermarkets or Shell, the rest all charge too much.

absolutly outragous i cant sfford to pay more for petrol. does it not cost enough???

I noticed how the rise in the cost of fuel was the last straw that broke the camels back. The high oil prices prices, together with rising credit costs, were instrumental in reducing the disposable earnings available to keep the economy expanding. Moron Browns methods are ensuring the early relegation of Britain to Third World Country status. Over exagerating ? Just watch our balance of trade. . . .. . . . . . .Watch Daniel Hannan on youtube.

The government are doing nothing to help the middle class working family, and despite the current climate. Why the cost of fuel increase - absolute disgrace!! whats worng with them !

There will never be any good news; not for the motorist, not for the working man, not for anyone at all, for as long as this odious shower are in government. They take the woefully overworked and unrewarded folk for fools. Let's show what we think and get rid of them when they finally show enough bravery in calling for a general election...and all of us keep in mind the lies they've told. Any promises they make will never come true.

Anyone else thinking its time for a fuel blockade like a few years ago? It almost worked as fuel was running dry. I do a 100mile round trip to work and back every day, due the government being unable to control our financial industry.

And now i have to pay an extra 2p per litre. The price of fuel in our contry is a joke. The only way oil companies are able to get away with the price of petrol being so high is because the government charge so much tax on it.

The VAT reduction was simly a ploy to give them to raise VAT above 17.5% when the 15% runs out. So this means along with any other tax rises, the cost of fuel is going to rocket within 3years.

They say they want us to use 'green' cars. Why don't they make LPG more available or encourage more manufacturers to produce LPG care etc? Why, because they will loose out on valuable tax revenue! The same basis as the 'green' airport tax!

Yes I am very much against the 2p increase in fuel tax but even more important is to try to get the oil companys to lower forecourt prices as quickly as they put them up

Increasing fuel prices at the height of the financial crisis that we are in is crazy. This just adds further pressure to people and businesses struggling to make ends meet and also adds to the apparent excuses for all other product prices remaining high or going higher as it is too easy for producers and distributors of essential products like milk, bread etc., to say their costs are increasing all the time.

The government needs to have a long hard look at itself and decide if they really want to help the people struggling to pay their bills, to prevent more homes being re-posessed and prevent further redundancies due to small businesses not being able to stay competitive and maintain a market share with revenue and profits that allow them to stay in business.

as you forcast the rise came in yesturday....after viewing the vidio of brown again it makes you realise what a lying B he is iam printing off you forcast and handing out to as many as i can thanks for all you updates ... TERRY

10253

Realistic price if you run a petrol station is 95.9 minimum so count yourself lucky if you're paying 92.9, that's nearly below cost.

Why are oil companies profits unjustified? - don't you like the billions they pay in tax? Don't you like the benefit our pension funds receive by investing in profitable companies? Don't you like the employment provided by petrol retailers?

Do you really think oil companies make their money by running petrol stations in the UK? They don't.

Your simplistic arguments simply don't bear scrutiny - oil prices have increased nearly 50% from recent lows as an example. Don't wind yourself up about things which aren't true (seems to be the main pastime on this blog).

... and the fuel companies take full advantage !

I get my petrol at a Shell Garage (Lake Gates, near Wimborne, Dorset) because it's the cheapest around, at least on my 55 mile (round trip) route to work every day. About 2 weeks ago unleaded was 88p a litre there, and then it went up to 89p. Yesterday it went up another penny, even though to my knowledge oil prices have not risen lately. And then what happens today ? Up another 2p to 92p, that's 4p in a couple of weeks, 2p for the Government and another 2p for Shell !

It's a shame that 'rent-a-mob' don't stop wasting their time attacking the City (and affecting no-one but the police and raising everyone's insurance premiums) and start targetting the petrol companies for the huge, unjustified profits they make.

Cigs petrol diesel and alcohol should be hammered in forthcoming budget.Pump the extra cash into health and crime prevention.

well its the same old story a bank holiday approaches and yes you guessed it the price of fuel goes sky high how do they get away with it they dont need any excuses to put prices up its when its suits them and when it most hurts our pockets !!
school holiday times are expendsive enough without this hike in prices why is it that when theres a shortage of ANYTHING the price goes up but when supplies are back to normal the prices dont do the same
margaret evans shrewsbury

Well at the moment things don’t look good and it’s the people of this country that are suffering. We need the fuel prices to be low to function even.
It was the will of the government to build a nation that is totally dependant on transport now it wants to price us off the roads and does not look at alternatives even when it is giving billion of pounds to the auto motive industry but not with the condition of looking at hydro technology which Honda has produced......

but then again the politicians that can claim all there expenses from government funds and at times get there homes paid for and travel and x rated movies does not seem right to me.

But what gets me is that the high politicians drive around in 3-4 litre engine cars and then they tell us that we should be more responsible when it comes to our cars,

But then probably drop there sprogs off in there 4+4s to school


And who wants to wait for 30-1 hour in the dam rain for a bus we don’t have the best transport system any more and the freedom of the car the only real thing we do have left, and the big brother state wants to take this away from us as well and price off the roads.

But when you love driving and then be told to take the bus or the train is just not on especially if you don’t know what the financial climate may bring.

This extra duty is needed, as it helps pay for the MP's porn films...

hi
I'm registered disabled and depend on my car for every day things like shopping and the school run but with the price of petrol rising all the time i'm starting to really notice the increase in petrol prices. It seems to me that we are being ripped off left right and centre, and the goverment just don't seem to care.

Isn't it funny how the fuel increases were meant to happen today, Wednesday 1st April but my local supermarkets have risen theirs since this weekend before!!!! And both by the 2p you mentioned in your blog! Everyone's just out to rip us off! Gordon Brown should make them lower it again as he promised it wouldn't rise.

I totally agree with Richard L's post of 18th March ("Think about this though - We should aim to have a mass week of public action during that week no one should buy petrol/diesel, and possibly stop using our cars"). What is wrong with the people of this country, we complain and complain again but do not take any effective action (myself included). Its high time we stood up and be counted instead of rolling over and taking everything that's flung at us.

Well what can i say what a mess this country is in! Its time the Bristish people stood together and let the government know what they think - but do they? no - they just keep paying but what happens when they can't afford to pay as wages don't go up in line with everything else - council tax, fuel prices and as we know when fuel goes up everything transported using fuel goes up, the only thing not going up in comparioson is wages!

It appears to me that M.Ps look after there own selfish interests and think that the general population are dim enough not to realise. Fuel is an essential item in rural area's as public transport is limited, and for the government to add extra to the cost on an anual basis is all but criminal.
This government supposedly support the working man, but it seems to cover up all the perks and bonuses of failed executives which is causing resentment.

4789 Steve M

Another load of claptrap from a financial illiterate. It's pennies you fool! So you noticed the country is in bad shape - where does the money come from to pay unemployment benefit - oh yeah, from taxes. Duty = tax = affordable if you have a car. £1 per week and fractions of a penny added to the distribution costs of each item in the shops. Quit whining!

And, as noticed by those with a brain: "the full year" not "a full year". You had your year so stop blubbing and being so selfish. Open your eyes and your mind - it's NOT all about YOU.

There seems to be a continuing policy of hit the country dwellers as hard as possible. We have a 'Bus Pass', but with minimal services what is the purpose. You can get there but not back, if you stay more than an hour.
Why have many country houses more than one car? To be able to live a normal active life.
Additional charges only help to pay MP's additional expenses. I wish that I could think of over £100,000 expenses per year, in addition to my pension!

Brian Thompson