FUEL TAX

"We don't want three more of the bastards out there spreading poison"

John Major, off the record briefing to Michael Brunson, ITN, 23 July 1993. The introduction of VAT on Fuel. 

Mr. Hague seriously expects us to believe that  Labour have given us this terrible fuel tax and calls for it to be reduced it now. Do they really believe the people they wish to represent are so dense that they have forgotten year after year of increases in fuel tax under the Conservative government?

Here are the FACTS you decide.

1. The price of crude oil has risen from around ten dollars a barrel at the beginning of last year to around 30 dollars today. 
   
2. Since the March 1999 Budget, petrol prices have risen from 66p per litre to 85p per litre: an increase of 19 pence. Only 1.89 pence of this increase was caused by the 2000 Budget duty increase. 
   
3. The Government pledged to stick to the previous government’s spending plans for the first two years. In their third year, they scrapped the Tories’ fuel duty escalator. Those tough choices have delivered economic stability, cut the deficit, put public finances back on track and delivered over 900,000 extra jobs and more for public services like schools, hospitals and transport.
   
4. Pump prices have risen too - because high crude oil and wholesale petrol prices are being passed to the consumer by producers and oil companies.
   
5. Budget 2000 delivered the lowest increase for 11 years: 1.89p per litre. It costs average motorist (9,300 miles p/a) around £20 per year - less than £2 a month. 
   
6. Under the Tories, car tax increased by £45 between 1993 and 1996, under Labour’s   last two budgets £400 million has been cut off people’s vehicle tax bills, and there has  been a £55 cut in VED for the drivers of 4 million smaller cars of 1200cc or less.
   
7. Since the March 1999 Budget, petrol prices have risen from 66p per litre to 85p per  litre: an increase of 19 pence. Only 1.89 pence of this increase was caused by the   2000 Budget duty increase. 
   
8. The Fuel Duty escalator was introduced by the last Tory government in 1993. Labour scrapped the Fuel Duty Escalator which resulted in annual real-terms increases in petrol prices and which was introduced by the previous government.  That means petrol prices are lower than they would have been had the last government’s Fuel Duty  Escalator not been abolished.
   
9. International price of wholesale petrol has increased by over 70% since January 2000,  because of uncertainties and shortages in the market.
   
10. A 2 pence cut in fuel duty would cost almost a billion pounds per year. 
    
11. In 1996, shadow chief secretary David Heathcoat-Amory said: “The price of fuels is not set by the Government.” 
    

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