Petition For Lower Tax On Petrol

[anzo]

But these taxes, or 'Green taxes' as they like to call them are a bit of a false ecomony.

Myself, and many other across the UK -

It costs me £10 in fuel to get to and from work each day (thats £10 with todays prices - it hasn't effected me much) - ideally for the planet I should be getting the bus as there is a route straight from my house to my work.

However this costs £2.80 per day (£14 per week) - much more than it would in the car. So for an extra £4 a week I can sit on an unreliable bus, listening to someone elses music and sit with the fattest person in Derbyshire...hmmm, tough call.

[Mark W]

OPEC putting up the price of oil because they're having to restrict the supply because no-one's trying to either reduce their usage or come up with viable solutions isn't a 'green tax'.

[N.Wood]

True, to an extent.

I just hope it means people think twice about making non-essential journeys in their cars. It's like people still don't see this as being the tip of the iceberg of us running out of oil (Meaning prices are going to get much, much higher), and think that it's their God-given right to be able to buy petrol for cheap as hell. It's a finite resource that we're getting really close to running out of. Warning signs like it becoming well expensive need to be heeded.

I know of a few people who've raised their prices from £20 a lesson to £22 to cover fuel.

We're really not.

Oil production has not peaked yet.

[Mark W]

The majority of sources I've seen are hinting that it has, or we're about to?

[N.Wood]

I presume those sources are from within the media?

As you well know, even the least biast media sources are skewed somewhat by various factors.

I'm a 3rd year Applied Geology student (so i learnt about oil production/prospecting etc last year) and my lecturers are or have been heavily involved with the oil industry.

In my eyes, thats the least biast source, as its totally independant from the government/media and is 'straight from the horses mouth' so to speak.

They have all said the media and government is blowing the whole deal up, and there are huge resource bases yet to be exploited.

[Mark W]

Nah, not just media. But yeah, they definitely are trying to whip everyone into a frenzy with it, in exactly the same way they did/are doing with global warming.

I know we're not going to run out tomorrow or anything like that, but petrol prices aren't realistically going to go down in the foreseeable future, which is the point I was getting at. Like it said in that Independent article, prices per barrel are around $133-135, and bearing in mind last year in the autumn people were shitting it 'cos it was getting to around $100, it's not just our government deciding to cream a little bit off the top of what we pay for fuel (Especially bearing in mind the extra fuel prices enforced by the government aren't coming in 'til October. If you want to save money motoring-wise, it'd be better petitioning against the plans for road tax which is gonna see 70+% of people paying around £200 more - MPs are currently trying to stop the government from putting them into place, so that's an area where a crappy online petition might actually work).

[OD404]

The majority of sources I've seen are hinting that it has, or we're about to?

The last insider report I saw put oil reserves at lasting around 400yrs. The amount of oil left is NOT the issue and to the industry it never has been. What is the issue here is the cost of getting the oil out of the ground. For example in the Canadian oil sands it actually costs more to get the oil out than they can sell it for.

Half the reports that get distributed round the industry rarely see the public light of day, so it doesn't suprise me that people don't have the right end of the stick.

PS. My department is budgeted to burn $15m of tax-free diesel this year alone

[Token]

OBM you're so lucky, you can just pop around the city on dans le b-u-mx.

[Mark W]

The last insider report I saw put oil reserves at lasting around 400yrs. The amount of oil left is NOT the issue and to the industry it never has been. What is the issue here is the cost of getting the oil out of the ground. For example in the Canadian oil sands it actually costs more to get the oil out than they can sell it for.

Half the reports that get distributed round the industry rarely see the public light of day, so it doesn't suprise me that people don't have the right end of the stick.

PS. My department is budgeted to burn $15m of tax-free diesel this year alone

How soon before we properly notice the effects of it then? If it's all gone in 400 years, then bearing in mind almost every industry on the planet relies heavily on oil-based product, I'm guessing we'll feel the effects of it a lot before then? Or is it 400 years bearing in mind fluctuating usage?

OBM you're so lucky, you can just pop around the city on dans le b-u-mx.

When I lived in Wales I'd just go places by train...

And "you can just pop around the city on in the b-u-mx" doesn't make sense

[OD404]

If I remember correctly it's 400 years based on current useage of current stocks that we have access to. There is a lot more we haven't accessed yet and no-one seems to want to put a figure to how much that actually is.

[Mark W]

Fair enough, I'll sleep easy tonight then?

[N.Wood]

If I remember correctly it's 400 years based on current useage of current stocks that we have access to. There is a lot more we haven't accessed yet and no-one seems to want to put a figure to how much that actually is.

Exactly, you seem very clued up on the subject which is good to see!

I dunno if any one knows how hard it is to find oil now the obvious places have been exploited (i.e a huge anticline in a shale parasequence {a big hill in a [predominantly shale area}), but seismic techniques are getting better and better by the day, the resolution has improved massively over the past 3 or so years i've been 'interested' in oil.

As that technology gets better, the risk decreases as you have a better idea of whether you'll get a dry hole ( ) or not.

Increased certainty decreases costs which makes previously uneconomically viable sources viable. This = 'more' oil (or a reserve as we call it, money in the bank if you will) which is good for everyone.

The majority of North America and Canada is made up of oil shale, which has yet to be exploited and is estimated to yield over 6 trillion barrels of oil.

Aaaaaaaaaannnnyways, whats this thread about again?

[Mark W]

something about piss and wind springs to mind...

[OD404]

Fair enough, I'll sleep easy tonight then?

Well no, it is up to us to cut back where we can because there will come a day when oil supply gets tight. Better to start now than later, but the big issue I have with the tax is that it is linked to everything else. Fuel prices go up, and so does everyother basic need that we have (food for example). It's pretty obvious that people are going to start stuggling with all these price increases to basic comodities, but the government seem unwilling to help the country out. By lowering fuel duty, not only will fuel be cheaper, but it will control the cost of food as delivery will be cheaper.

That's my whole issue. It's been proven time and time again that cost of fuel is in no way linked to the population's use of it. The vast majority of journeys are those of necessity through commuting (not everyone who works in London can afford to live there comfortably) so people are unable to cut back. And the car is still more economical in terms of pounds per mile per hour than any public transport, which is why you won't ever see a mass exodus to trains and buses.

[Mark W]

The price of oil itself fluctuates a lot though, so wouldn't that mean they'd constantly be having to dick around with tax to help out the country when it was needed, then sorta 'make the most' (So to speak) when everything's tickety boo?

[OD404]

The price of oil itself fluctuates a lot though, so wouldn't that mean they'd constantly be having to dick around with tax to help out the country when it was needed, then sorta 'make the most' (So to speak) when everything's tickety boo?

It fluctuates yes, but this is more than a fluctuation...

[Mark W]

True, I guess...

[Tomm]

Someone make a petition saying that the cost of petrol in America has to 'balance' in line with here, so their prices go up a bit, and ours go down. I'd sign it.

[Fish-Finger-er]

the problem is not so much with the cost of fuel as i see it. im paying £1.27 a litre for diesel, thats that. but its more how much the government are making on it goes up as the cost of the petrol/diesel goes up. in 2005 the government where making around 60p per litre on petrol/diesel in tax. now there making above 65p per litre. i understand oil prices have gone up, and the duty on fuel is calculated as a percentage of the fuel price, but surely shouldnt this be adjusted, so the government where making 60p a litre once more. dropping the price of fuel 5p doesnt seem like an awful lot (since i started driving, fuel has jumped up over 30p per litre, but its only costing me £8 a week extra, which isnt much) but to a haulage company, using 300 litres per wagon per day( a reasonable figure) then your talking like a £600 a week increase in fuel costs for each wagon on the road,and £100 per wagon per week extra in tax since i started driving in 2005. so if every wagon on the road is making the government an extra £100 a week more than it was 2005. surely the govermnent are making millions of extra pounds in fuel duty every week compared to what they where in 2005.

[Revolver]

I haven't signed this just yet.

What I was going to say is, petrol tax seems to be the main source of british economy (it can't be though) and could never be done away with.

Bastards. Seriously considering a 4-stroke motorbike over a 2-stroke purely over efficiency.

[Dr. Nick Riviera]

Reactionary bastards...

[Will Arnold]

what a crock of shit this whole saga is. one of the MP's (cant remember who) actually claimed back his car tax! yes thats right, he's paying his tax with the taxpayers money... what the hell's going on. also each MP gets a home payed for with an upper limit of 10 grand to spend on their bathrooms.......WHAT! we're paying extra tax so they can have much much more than alot of people have...hmmm. its like all the people in power never have the misfortune of living in a part of this frickin tax haven!

imo if things dont start to shape up i think somekind of large protest is in order! arrg

[hI-OOPS-CAPS]

100£ to fill my 1.0L and sisters 1.4L cars, just feckin rediculous

what could the government need so much money for. if they decided multiculturism and all the 100s of other projects that are so demending on money are not necessary then im sure all this living costs malarky wouldnt be as high

[Token]

I've turned to stealing fuel now. Buying 12 litres of Cooking Oil, an not paying for the last 3 litre bottle. Average price per litre is a 93p. I'm fed up with feeling like im having my arse cheeks split open each time I fill up.

[hI-OOPS-CAPS]

i was just informed by my not-so-reliable mates that gordon brown is lowering petrol by 12p, anyone else know of this? and please take this with a pinch of salt