Fuel prices are absolute disgrace. Before we changed from gallons to litres, diesel was cheaper than unleaded, fuel rarely increased by 2 or 3pence a gallon. It as never been known for fuel to increase so much whats going on. Of course the goverments happy for the extra tax so they don't care how much fuel goes up. And finally if the price of a barrel of oil is in dollars, the pound is doing well against the dollar why dont we benifit

Steve.S, Cramlington,

the tax on fuel is nothing to do with globle warming its all to do with money for the goverment .when they say pass the cost onto the people you carry for they want to try it.you get told some one will do it for that rate so please your self.if we all just parked up for a week we would be braking no laws and the goverment would have to see sence.

dave, pontefract, westyorkshire

I have just filled up with diesel at Tesco at 105.99 per litre,my wife and I both have diesel cars as we assumed that they were better for the envirionment according to government statistics,wrong they are better at producing tax for the government to waste on jolly boys outings.More effort and highgrants should be given to solar and wind power installations for home owners.Lower taxation should be given to road hauliers fuel costs to keep cost of transportation as low as possible ,keeping shop prices at a realistic and affordable level to any income bracket.,not just expenses paid MPs.

J.Watson, Chadwell Heath, Essex

i have to drive my car as my wife is disabled my fuel bill has increased by £5.00p per week in the last six months my wife cant use public transport so ive no option but the prices keep going up about time for protest which i hope all the disabled drivers and carers will join to let this lot know they cant get away with robbery.

stuart shires, dewsbury, west yorkshire

I have just seen a garage advertising diesil at 109.9 per Ltr! A few months back we were all shocked at the prospect that fuel prices would break the £1 barrier...well we've clearly passed that now and further increases are in the pipeline. With a government led by Mr Brown who seem intent on continuing their policy to increase taxes a firm signal needs to be sent telling them that this is not acceptable!
To the UK hauliers.....when is someone going to start kicking off another protest as this is really hurting our pockets .I`m sure with the news that foreign drivers delivering in our country are now fitting bigger tanks so they can fill up on the other side of the channel will be motivation enough!!
http://www.fuelprotest.com/

Mark Hughes, Leicester, Leicestershire

Agrre with most of you, and as for LPG prices, well the only reason that is so cheap still, is because so few people have it. In the same way that Diesel used to be cheaper than LRP when very few people had diesel cars. But now? Diesel is on average 5P more per litre in Urban areas (have noticed LRP hugher in Rural districts)

Anyway, the sooner something MAJOR is done, the better, and For the sake of the British Economy (Whats left of it) I hope it happens soon

Mark Davies, Penarth, Vale of Glamorgan

Almost 10% increase, in the last month, its 107p a litre in Birmingham, Put this on top of all the other increases in everything else, UK is going to the dogs, wages are dropping, everything else is rising......

Steve, Birmingham,

Totaly agree , well put . I use my car for work and thats it , work only . I get very depressed and frustrated every time i pass a forecourt and see the price of fuel as gone up again i dont earn i great deal and i am finding it hard to absorb the increased cost of driving .

dennis, rochdale,

all i can say is yes tax is high its going to kill the country in the end

the only thing hauliers can do to stop it, is to ALL and i mean ALL get together and take all wagons off the road until the government see sence

wont take long because they are the backbone of the country
for delieveries of food , mail, and countless other things

but i bet they would outlaw that to

lenny, high tax place,

as usual the rich are robbing the poorest off our community
this government is charging far too much taxes to innocent britains which is not surprising that so many are moving overseas where the prices are cheaper.
its a total digrace!

linda cleaver, orpington kent, england

This Government is stealing money from the public and specially drivers who have to use their cars to get to work. But, they lie and say the rises in price are due to the cost of crude oil, and to save the environment. What rubbish. The same fuel is bought by all our EU neighbours on the same market at the same spot price, and yet their garage fuel per litre charges are far less than ours, somewhat equivalent to 70 to 75 pence per litre. The answer lies in the taxes and VAT levied, under the guise of saving the world environment, but in reality another stealth tax by this socialist 'spend the tax payers' money' government. They tax more as they cannot control their spending. All politicians are liars and free-loaders, over-paid from our taxes, waste or spend our money on their pet projects and use every subterfuge to get more taxes out of us. Let's VOTE them out now, and tell Brown he's a new loser. Let's blockade fuel depots NOW. We want parity and justice.

Richard Ord, Edinburgh, Scotland

Too much tax all round, fuel is the least of it.

BrummyDoug, Birmingham, England

High excise on fuel is also an issue we face in Australia. Unfortunately, this form of revenue is easily controlled by regulators and provides a guaranteed income stream for governments. With rising prices, and the apparent arrival of 'peak oil', it would appear that a new balance needs to be struck between fiscal requirements, the encouragement of alternative fuel sources, and the pragmatics of business viability.

Stephen, Sydney, Australia

Be happy and stop complaining -- and remember to re-elect the same people when the time comes, er.

David Masu, Zürich,

Come on guys, lets get the numbers correct and start blaming "The Bottler". He depends on you not being able to understand the numbers for his stealth tax plan.
The market price of unleaded today is 30.44 pence per litre. add Vat on that, 5.3. Add duty at 50.35. Add Vat on the duty 8.81. Margins for importer/delivery/retailer 4.17. Vat on margins 0.73. Adds up to 99.8 pence per litre in Southampton today.

Colin, Southampton, UK

i think every haulier in the uk should buy enough red diesel to run his fleet for one week, and set a date and everybody use the rebated fuel for one week,are they going to impound every vehicle on the road
as for one of the writers said our 18 wheeler days are over,he just proves how weak the british are as he would rather see the european trucks come into the uk with 1500 litres of fuel onboard there trucks at an average cost of 70 pence a litre and run round the uk with no road tax in the window and no tolls to pay,pinch our work that we cannot compete with as they can do it far cheaper than uk hauliers,then return across the chanel to re fuel ready for the next week

bruce charles, llanelli, uk

john in london is wrong.80p tax is a myth.in fact tax relative too the price of crude has held pretty steady.I agree that the increase in price should have made more profit for the government from VAT so a small drop in duty wouldn't really hurt the treasury.

john, corby, england

There are so many injustices in the world, and what what the one that nearly brought the UK to a standstill 7 years ago? Expensive petrol. So much more unfair than people dying by the million from AIDS, genocide, ineptly managed wars, etc. The fuel protests were a triumph for selfishness over decency.

We need to rely less on fossil fuel. Not just because of climate change, but also because the more we use, the scarcer supplies will get. The government should help hauliers by business tax concessions, not reducing fuel duty.

Dr Richard Milne, Edinburgh,

Shouldnt they Baulk? Balk is American spelling.

Kenneth Williams, amersham, uk

If the tax on fuel was lower, the Government would have raise that tax some other way.......income tax, VAT interest rates etc. Get used to it !!!

Tony H, Leeds,

As usual this control-freak government keep taxing everyone to death. They could reduce fuel duty (they take 45p for every litre) - but they won't because Gordon's too busy spunking all of our money on the jobless thousands to give the working peole of this country a restbite.

Git !

Richard Powell, Wokingham, England

Face facts, fuel prices are going to increase. The answer is that the increased cost of transport will have to be passed onto the consumer.

There is a way around the fuel price hikes. More people are converting their vehicles to run on vegetable oils. I do wonder why lorry drivers don't run their vehicles on bio diesel.

David Solomons, London,

In the past three months petrol has increased by around 10p a litre. Now 2p of that was due to the Chancellor's fuel escalator, but another 2p... is VAT on the price increase.

But as we've come to expect our Chancellor is content to sit on his arse watching people struggle in the current conditions. No offer to keep prices under control, just a shrug of the shoulders as if "nothing I can do".

Well you should be doing something. Clearly Labour has forgotton the lesson it was taught in 2001, and needs to see civil unrest and protest again to make it consider the issue.

Perhaps David Cameron would like to pick the issue up and campaign on behalf of the people he puports to represent?

John, Bournemouth,

Everybody reading this take two or three minutes out of your week to email the government about this and all the other problems. If enough of us complain they will have to do something! Put a notice in your car window as well! If people weren't so apathetic then something might be done!

Rob Lindsay, Wallasey,

THERE IS NO SHORTAGE OF OIL... the price has been driven up by speculaters creating a false demand and therefore increasing prices.........This was reported in The Sunday Times !!
What is the point of having a Government if they cant prevent this?

Patrick Eccles, Belfast , UK

All these people who winge about the rising cost of fuel are forgetting a couple of points. Firstly, the real cost of motoring has actually FALLEN since 1997. Secondly, the motorist is not paying the full cost of using petrol by about £0.21 per mile when accounting for climate change, air pollution, noise, congestion & accidents.In the longer term, the price of oil will continue on it's upward trend as demand now exceeds supply worldwide & will continue to. You'd better get used to it.
At least the cost of petrol in the UK is closer to what it should be & it is the rest of Europe & the US in particular that should be increasing fuel duty.
Perhaps it might also help if many people exchanged their gas guzzling 4 X 4s & two seater sports for economical models. Also, 8% of the under one mile journeys & 25% of under two mile journeys (of all journeys) were made by car. In a significant number of cases walking or cycling would be a much cheaper, healthier & climate friendly alternative.

Simon Barker, Malvern, Worcestershire

The high fuel prices are unpleasant, but they do encourage fuel efficiency. When you buy a new car you will get a fuel efficient one. If Americans drove cars with mpg's like Europeans, there would be far less oil burned every year. If they taxed the fuel like Europeans do they wouldn't have a fiscal deficit. If they didn't need to import so much oil there probably wouldn't be an army in Iraq.

And you the voters want the schools and the hospitals. How do you propose to pay for them? Borrow the money??

And I am no friend of this government btw.

David B, Larkhall, UK

Petrol at £1 a lite, and most cars get about 10 miles to the litre (30-40 to the gallon). Go to the trains, or a taxi and ask how much it would cost to travel 10 miles. Ask a rickshaw... people drop £2 on a cup of coffee without thinking... but ask them to pay £2 to move over a ton of steel 20 miles and they complain... people don't realise how cheap fuel is!

mark yates, bracknell,

If the public cannot accept fuel duty increases, what is the solution to congestion on our roads?

Los Angeles has always advocated 'build more roads' as the answer to this question, and yet it has the most congested streets in the world. Road generate traffic.

Thomas Davidson, Manchester,

How can a big supermarket chain (Morrisons)justify a 2p per litre difference in price between two of their petrol stations 5 miles apart, which they are doing locally to myself?

James Turner, Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire

The Government is to blame for high fuel prices, as they STEAL money from us under the guise of environmental taxes. All Ministers and Governments lie about the price of fuel, it is their taxes that are destroying our lives and raising prices. The same fuel is bought by all our neighbours on the spot markets and yet European prices are much lower than ours. Why? Because of taxes and VAT.
We are being cheated and conned into believing the environmental propaganda for the taxes, and that there are fuel shortagesl. There are not, rather it is the shortage of refining capacity that is causing the shortfall, and speculators, of which our USELESS Government is one. They speculate on price rises induced by speculators and reap the tax benefits from the resultant price rises.
Until we all say enough is enough, it will go on. We should all vote them all out of office. And, that should be a warning to any prospective MPs.

Richard Ord, Dunfermline, Scotland

Oil priced in US dollars?
£ continues strengthening against the US dollar?
What would current oil price have been at pound/dollar relationship of 3 months ago
Who gains from lower dollar?

william burr, Colchester, UK

The Government taxes us on fuel by roughly 50% or 52p for a litre, they have the British public robbed, petrol, diesel is higher in the UK than anywhere else in the world.

However the forecourts don't help either , there is a 7p fluctuation in price per litre in a square mile where I live.

Alan Kerr, Belfast, UK

Can we have a petition to reduce the VAT on fuel down to 5% after all it is a neccessary energy source the same as Gas and Electricity for which we pay 5% VAT.
This would help reduce the price down to around 90p a litre although I am sure the Treasury would not agree to this.
Come on all you motorists its time we took a stance.

NEIL MELROSE, Cramlington, Northumberland., United Kingdom

I intend to write to Gordon Brown just to let him know that, each time I drive into or past a petrol station posting prices at or above £1 a litre, it is a reminder to me not to vote New Labour. And should he delay the election in the hope that we all forget about this, there's another increase coming next year and the year after - so I know I won' t forget.

David Britten, Farnham, UK / Surrey

It's bad enough to consider that 80% of the price of UK petrol is tax, but this takes on a surreal aspect when you realise that this represents a tax levy of over 600% on the producer price. In fact, it's completely insane!!

David Britten, Farnham, UK / Surrey

my suggestion is to just block roads all over the country as im sure im not the only one that will want to do this My car is needed on a day to day basis due to an illness and i have to travel to hospital and surgerys daily to which i can not afford I say all stand together

andy, plymouth, uk

I seem to remember from some while ago that the pump price of fuel was made up of 20 percent fuel cost and 80 percent Tax, and I doubt the ratio has changed much! Fuel users are a cash cow, pure and simple.

Bill Glanvill, Horsham, W Sussex

As someone else pointed out here, perhaps trucking tomatoes from southern Spain to Edinburgh is actually a highly inefficient use of precious oil resources. All that's happening is that the market is finally saying to hauliers "you've had your day". High fuel duty in the UK is possibly a good thing as it will force the necessary change to happen earlier and give our economy more time to adjust plus sheltering us to some extent from volatililty in the global oil markets.

Dave, London, UK

The trouble is that as well as high oil prices (that all countries have to pay). here in Britain we have a government that gives itself two fuel tax rises per year, and this is on top of the highest fulel duties in Europe.

Michael Cawood, Wrexham, Wales, UK

"Keep in mind that it's the working class that is leading the charge. Fuel protest and speed camera destruction. The middle class have got too much to lose, and besides, they don't have unions to organise protest. "

The middle classes will soon have nothing left to lose. It is they who have been taxed to the hilt to pay for QuangoLand (£1/3 BILLION a DAY) and the Welfare State, and once we slide back into negative equity again, that's it for the middle classes. Nowt left there TO screw out of them.

Then whaddya gonna do, Gordon?

Jeremy Poynton, Fromeville, 51st State

Petrol here in NZ is about $1.70 per litre (approximately 63pence).
The price does fluctuate markedly both downwards and upwards (unlike the UK where it only seems to move in an upward direction).

Given the distance from anywhere to NZ, there obviously has to be a premium to the price so just goes to show the level of taxation in UK.

Stewart Watson, Paraparaumu, New Zealand

I want to protest, with fuel costing £1 a litre 70 pence is tax and 30 pence fuel and delivery, when I re-fuel, I am actually filling my car up with tax. This is unsustainable, making our economy uncompetitive and overpriced. Let's make the point to the government.

charlie, wolverhampton, UK

What amazes me is the disparity in fuel charges across the UK. I appreciate that transport costs are a factor, but LPG costs 53p per litre in the south and as low as 37p in Yorkshire. That is not tax. That is fuel supplier greed.

Ray Fowell, Doncaster, UK

We certainly need some action against the Governments ludicrous fuel taxation. The oil companies dont want to lose their revenue and the Government dont want to lose theirs.

Well guess which one the people will blame and take action against?

Phill Barlow, The Wirral, England

If you think £1 a litre is a high price to pay, just think how much our wasteful Western lifestyle costs the two billion human beings who live on less than £1 a day to pay for EVERYTHING! It's a sad indictment on all of us that we are willing to protest against something like high fuel prices but care less about 50,000 neighbours who die every day for want of food, water and basic medicine. Shame on us!

Roger Steare, Sevenoaks, Kent

With all of the extra money that the government has been receiving in the VAT on the higher price how can they justify the recent 2p/litre duty increase? However, is there a connection between charging the poor more to drive their cars, whilst ensuring that MPs and Lords are able to claim enough in 'expenses'? (This, of course, may just be the cynics view).

David Leslie, Perth, Scotland

As usual most readers get it wrong when it comes to the price of petrol...........
Petrol coming in to this country costs 15p to 20p a litre.....
Gorden Brown applies 80p tax at the moment and gets it.

The higher fuel goes the more money he makes... At this time he is makeing 12M to 15M a day in profit......from everybody that buys or uses fuel.

This is not going to change. In the UK we have talkers and people with all kinds of ideas. Bottom line is brits are cowards when it comes to goverement.....

John, London, UK

This is the way of the future.

The world's oil production reached around 86 million barrels/day in 2006 and it looks like it will be 84 million this year. The decline will be slow and inevitable. UK oil production peaked in 1999 and will soon be at half its peak.

Face up to it guys! The days of the multi-thousand mile salad are coming to an end. Find yourselves another business based on local resources.

By all means get angry with the politicians who have not prepared you for this, but think of your 18-wheeler as a sort of Ford model T. Its days are coming to an end.

Alfred, Ryde, Isle of Wight

How did we actually get here ? Well actually it's very simple. The Western goverments and central banks refused to allow the business cycles to play out. They interfered with very cheap rates on the cost of money. The natural consequence of this action was fuller employment and higher demand relative to supply globally. Many many people got happy off this.
Now we are at a turning point. Money is more expensive so what will the goverments do ? If they interfere as they did on prior occasions and indeed as the hauliers would like them to then demand keeps going up and so will the costs of energy and basic resources.
A reasonable contraction at this point would be healthy for the majority although there will be financial casualties at the margins now. Interfere again and their will be casualties in the mainstream. It's a choice between now and later and the scale of casualties.

SC, PRESTON,

I am an expat working in the gulf. Petrol here is 15 p a litre and there has been no increase in 2 years. I realise this is an oil producing country but it makes you realise just how much fuel is taxed in the UK. When I return to visit the UK I am now more aware of how virtually everything you spend is taxed and yet services seem to be getting worse. No wonder GB didn't want an early election.

K Hardy, Muscat, Oman

VOTE THEM OUT!! before they damage this country any more.
I know people who have been very vociferous in their past support for the labour party but they have now completely turned the other way and have seen the LIGHT! Halleluja,
bring on the Election.

malcolm common, blyth,

Pick out one Oil Company and boycott it.
Exxon would be a good start. They paid for Bush's election
now let them suffer. Avoid Exxon for 1 month. If that does not work pick a second one for 2 months or a third one for 3 months. Bring the slick oil thieves to their knees.
Its a start????

D.Buckley, Cork, Ireland

Keep in mind that it's the working class that is leading the charge. Fuel protest and speed camera destruction. The middle class have got too much to lose, and besides, they don't have unions to organise protest.
That's how Labour have been getting away with it.

Andrew Milner, Karuizawa, Nagano