MSE Leaders' Debate: Petrol Prices

mjh421

Everybody seems to miss the point, we live in a free market economy, that is free to exploit every opportunity to make as much profit as possible.

There is no regard as to who suffers from the petrol companies they merely pursue what seems natural to them and get as much as possible for doing as little as possible.

We once owned a company called Britoil but that was sold off by the Tories who claimed it was better for us if it was in private hands, you are now paying the price for that.

Margaret Thatcher said at the time that the Norwegians, (who still have their oil company), were squandering their oil reserves by spending the oil revenues on their health system.

Just think how any increase in oil revenues could have been diverted into much needed public expenditure at times like this. But then Tories prefer the benefit to go to multi national oil companies instead.

flyingscotno1

I don't understand how the 'fuel price stabiliser' works? So they lose on tax when the price goes up. How does that pay off a deficit, so surely they'll just increase it?

Only the Lib Dem and SNP with rural rebates makes any sense what so ever.

iolanthe07

One advantage of high fuel prices is that the roads seem less congested. I noticed that last weekend driving up the M5 - it was almost a pleasure again. Every cloud has a silver lining.

thor

serafin13 wrote: »

One solution is to-
greatly reduce the fuel tax,

if this happened, let's say duty is reduced by 50p per litre then I have no doubts whatsoever that the oil companies would put it back on in a short time after and pocket the difference , safe in the knowledge they can blame the government and get away with it.

serafin13 wrote: »

and
charge a duty excess of £200 on a second car in a household,
£300 on a third car and so forth.

Agree with this 100% but with a higher charge perhaps.

rev_henry

Nice to see Mr Brown totally out of touch and not answering the question as usual. I don't see the problem with the Torys' stabiliser thing, seems a good idea to me; when we have lower prices our fuel duties subsidise when we pay less duty when the price goes up again?

I was in Greece a month or so ago and the motoring habits seemed bizarre. Petrol was about €1.40 over there, diesel was cheaper, yet NOBODY drove diesels except taxis. Even big SUVs, I saw a supercharged Range Rover parked next to a V8 (which I don't think you can even buy over here because it drinks fuel) disco 3 parked next to a jeep V8. I kept my eye out for diesels the whole week after noticing and I don't think I saw a single diesel.

kwaks

serafin13 wrote: »

One solution is to-
greatly reduce the fuel tax, and
charge a duty excess of £200 on a second car in a household,
£300 on a third car and so forth.

We need to use cycling, buses, and greater use of single family cars to REDUCE the number of vehicles on the road.

Great idea, lets call it it roadtax......oh wait a minute... guess thats where the £450, £200, £176 & £66 I already pay annually goes, with never more than 2 vehicles off my property at any one time.

Public transport is a good idea for those in city centres, however for most people in this country a car makes things a hell of a lot easier, whether it is for driving to the station to catch a train or doing the weekly shop. Cars are already being priced out of metro areas by parking charges, fuel costs are not required to complete this.

A lot of the problem is because we still trade oil & gas in dollars, easiest and simplest solution is to change that.(though our special relationship might suffer....hmm, i can live without being a lap dog, don't know if I can survive without transport)

flyingscotno1

rev_henry wrote: »

Nice to see Mr Brown totally out of touch and not answering the question as usual. I don't see the problem with the Torys' stabiliser thing, seems a good idea to me; when we have lower prices our fuel duties subsidise when we pay less duty when the price goes up again?

But here is the rub- fuel largely is going one way- up. It's had peaks and low points but the pattern is in the main up. If they set the fuel stabiliser at £1.20 at by next Jan we've been at true cost £1.30 for months, they're just going to increase it to cover the shortful- the massive deficit we have.

And what is to stop squeezed petrol retailers just pricing at a couple of pence over this stabiliser and the tax getting reduced and into their pockets?

So it is a genius solution of sounding as if they are going to do something, but really they are not! Total Tory spin and one reason I hope the two muppets in red and blue get a hung parliament.

We need to do something about rural fuel prices- ridiculous that some isolated areas in Scotland pay more tax than in Central London!

Rolandtheroadie

Get rid of road tax altogether and put it on fuel.
Then those who use it, pay for it. It also gets rid of road tax dodgers, sorn, fines for road tax offences etc etc.

rev_henry

scotsman4th wrote: »

Get rid of road tax altogether and put it on fuel.
Then those who use it, pay for it. It also gets rid of road tax dodgers, sorn, fines for road tax offences etc etc.

I'm sure I'm not the only young driver who would appreciate Australia's policy towards car insurance. 3rd party, minimum legally required there, only covers the driver's life, not even the car, is part of the service provided by their equivalent of Road Tax, so you can basically buy and drive whatever you like, rather than be at the mercy of insurance companies who have decided that they're going to unofficially make the de facto minimum driving age 20something...

flyingscotno1

rev_henry wrote: »

I'm sure I'm not the only young driver who would appreciate Australia's policy towards car insurance. 3rd party, minimum legally required there, only covers the driver's life, not even the car, is part of the service provided by their equivalent of Road Tax, so you can basically buy and drive whatever you like, rather than be at the mercy of insurance companies who have decided that they're going to unofficially make the de facto minimum driving age 20something...

How expensive would our fuel be with that added onto it- might only be third party but that is the biggest part of insurance- not you but what you hit in liability and repairs!