George Osborne, the Chancellor, has vowed to use his forthcoming Budget to help hard-pressed motorists as a fellow minister admitted soaring oil prices could send the cost of petrol to more than £2 a litre.
Chancellor George Osborne Photo: PA
Mr Osborne used a speech at the Conservative Spring Conference at Cardiff to reached out to what he called “squeezed” middle and lower-income voters paying £80 to fill up a family car. “I hear you,” he declared.
“I promise you I am doing everything I can to find a way to help.” His comments were the clearest signal yet he will use the Budget, in two-and-a-half weeks’ time, to announce that a planned rise in fuel duty, 1p above the level of inflation and to take effect from 1 April, will be scrapped.
He is likely also to bring in other measures to help motorists such as a fuel duty “escalator” – which would see the amount of duty payable by motorists fall when oil prices are high, and vice versa.
Last week Danny Alexander, the Liberal Democrat Treasury chief secretary, confirmed plans for a cut in duty of 5p in remote and island communities in Britain – a move widely thought to herald more general help for the motorist in the Budget.
Earlier Alan Duncan, the International Development minister, said the crisis gripping Libya and other Arab states was likely to push the cost of crude oil above $200 a barrel – well above the current record price.
A further “worst case” hike, sending oil prices to around £2.50, which would “translate” into British motorists paying £2.03 for a litre of unleaded fuel, more than half as much again as the current high price of £1.30 at the pumps. Mr Duncan said the current level could “look like a luxury” if the situation worsened. Continued
