I'm confused then, I totally accept that the government isn't responsible for all the increase but I thought that in Oct duty on fuel went up by 2p, which is closer to 2.3 pence after tax, it's due to go up again in April and i early 2009.
Was there? OK, I may be
slightly mistaken then...
Although over the last few years, the rate of increase in fuel duty has been well below inflation, so in
real terms it's gone down. Here's a good (although slightly out-of-date) short article on
UK Petrol Prices. There's also a very good longer article on what drives retail fuel prices
here - although it's mainly about US prices, the principles are the same.
I could be wrong it happens
Also, doesn't the goverment have huge stakes in the north sea oil? with the strength of the pound and barrels being in $ I think it would be hard to say that they're getting no benifit from the increase in oil prices, i have read that it's a lot of benifit.
And the weather is their fault, I wanted sun this morning and they look after the country
As for me getting into politics.....could be interesting
Well, yes, it's entirely true that the govt secures significant revenues from taxation of oil production. But there is no direct relationship between North Sea oil extraction costs and the price of fuel at the pump in the UK. Crude oil is a fully fungible commodity - it is sold into an international market. It's absolutely
not the case that oil produced from a Shell platform in the North Sea goes to a Shell refinery in the UK to be sold in a UK Shell station. What happens is that crude is sold on the international market, refiners buy on that international market and sell their products into
another international market. Wholesalers buy refinery products from that market, and then sell on to retailers.
Primary oil production, refining, wholesaling and retail are entirely separate operations.
Also, while it's true that the dollar is falling, the price of oil is rising in all major currencies, as can be seen
here.
In short, the price of petrol is going up because there just isn't enough of it in the world to satisfy demand. Just be glad we don't live in any of the many countries around the world (eg Nicaragua, Mexico, Nigeria, China, etc, etc) which are suffering actual
shortages.