If OPEC are going to continue price fixing all they are going to do is make biodiesel and bioethanol more appealing and more economically viable. If they're not careful they won't have any economic power at all.
teabelly
|
|
|
it would be interesting to see what happened if sufficient non-OPEC countries banded together and refused to buy at such a high price. Who would blink first?
We've tried that part of that one (in 73 and 79, when OPEC states cut exports): the answer is the oil-importing countries. We're so dependant on the stuff that even a small cut in output sends the price sky-high and causes huge economic shocks.
The growth on non-OPEC oil production reduced OPEC's power in the 80s and 90s, but rising demand has left supply finely balanced again ... so OPEC has the whip-hand again, if it can use it or wants to use it.
In the current market, OPEC countries would increase their income by cutting production. It's only some dirty diplomacy with the Saudis that keeps their production at high enough levels to politically neuter OPEC.
|
May has an interesting point. Fuel duty is justified on environental grounds - to increase the price artificially to a level that, just, deters its use enough.
So, if the base price rises for other reasons, then a duty increase announced prior to the increase is no longer needed and should be reversed. After all, the price has naturally risen to the level HMG knows it "needs" to be.
No sign of that, though.
|
"..the increase is no longer needed and should be reversed"
Which doesn't happen, because, like the PM, the Treasury lacks a reverse gear (or doesn't know how to select it). Also known as the 'ratchet principle'.
|
Or because the justification is simply a complete fabrication spun into existence by a cynical government in order to provide a superficially convincing justification for extracting more stealth taxes from a meek public without letting on the true extent of the tax and spend program wheeled into operation the mement they gained power.
Or maybe not. Whatever.
|
|
|
|
May has an interesting point. Fuel duty is justified on environental grounds - to increase the price artificially to a level that, just, deters its use enough.
That's one way of looking at the environmental purpose of fuel duty. Another purpose, though, is to offset all the wider costs to society of vehicle use (environmental, social, economic etc), and those costs are not directly related to fuel price. There is also the treasury's need for revenue: UK has low income tax by European standards, and the cash has to come from somewhere. (e.g. other EU countries have lower fuel duty, but much higher purchase tax on cars)
You may agree or disagree about the merits of the "wider costs to society" case, but May is taking only one part of a much more complex picture.
|
I like reading James May's articles. Well written and amusing.
But for most people who complain about the price of petrol or diesel I have zero sympathy, IF
1. they drive any car over 3 ltres
2. they complain and then don't buy a diesel
3. they drive a big SUV.
James May has a T2 Bentley with 6.75 litres of petrol engine plus a V8 Range Rover IIRC.
When people are prepared to drive gas guzzling giants, all talk of petrol boycotts is just talk.
If we all switched to diesel Fiat Pandas the Government might listen. Until then it's all hot air..:-)
madf
|
James May has a T2 Bentley with 6.75 litres of petrol engine plus a V8 Range Rover IIRC. When people are prepared to drive gas guzzling giants, all talk of petrol boycotts is just talk.
I think we should all encourage him to hang up his keys for a while. If he gave up driving those gas-guzzlers, there'd be lots more petrol for anyone else :)
|
I think we should all encourage him to hang up his keys for a while. If he gave up driving those gas-guzzlers, there'd be lots more petrol for anyone else :)
Ah, but that's the free market economy for you. Without it, would all those fuel efficient yet well specced cars have ever left the drawing board?
:o)
ND
|
|
|
|
There is also the treasury's need for revenue: UK has low income tax by European standards, and the cash has to come from somewhere.
Exactly.
|
The UK income tax is only "low" because it is perceived by the GB Public as the "headline tax". Politicians know this and instead of increasing Income Tax to fill the Treasury, they sneak extra taxes on other less headline grabbing things! Stealth Tax is the Norm - or should I say the "Gordon" now!
Roger in Spain
|
OOPS - sorry patently I posted my twopennorth before I read your entirely accurate one above!
Roger in Spain
|
|
|
Stealth Tax is the Norm - or should I say the "Gordon" now!
I like the pun :) But you're right: all parties are at it. Conservatives cut income tax and raised VAT; Labour cut income tax and raised other things ... and all the while the overall tax take has remained at abt the same proportion of GDP (within a few points of 40%).
One of the few things to fall significantly is the real (inflation-adjusted) cost of mottoring. Part of that fall is due to tax changes, like the abolition 12 years ago of the special 10% purchase tax on cars
|
Tax freedom day is a good way of representing overall tax take as a proportion of GDP. Take a look at this site - you may be as surprised as I was.
www.adamsmith.org/tax/what-is-tfd.php
|
New Labour throws its hands up as if to say rising petrol prices are not its fault (who started the war then)?
Around 80 per cent of what we pay for petrol - as we are all well aware - is in duty and VAT and that's for what is basically a waste product during refining as far as oil companies are concerned.
So we pay some of the highest prices in the world for our fuel, thanks to these taxes, even after oil companies have spent billions finding and bringing the stuff out of the ground, paying for licences to do so and then, on top of that, having to pay tax on the profits they make. The petrol station owners also pay tax on their modest profits (about 7-8p a gallon).
But New Labour conveniently forgets that the oil companies and the petrol stations, as with cigarette retailers and pub owners, are also unpaid tax revenue collectors of quite staggeringly vast sums of money. Like petrol, cigarettes and alcoholic drinks would be a fraction of the prices that have to be charged with such high duty levels.
But it doesn't forget if those same businesses are late with their VAT and other tax revenues collected on its behalf. In fact they will be fined, heavily, if they are behind with payments.
If every business was run on the same lines as goverments, especially Labour ones, then they would be bankrupt within a week.
Yet this is one "business" that not only has a monopoly, but can also raise its prices at will if inefficiency leads to requiring more of the folding stuff.
Sorry to rant, but the sheer hypocrisy of politicians, in particular the current lot in charge, makes me want to throw up.
The only answer is to not drink, smoke or drive a car and rely, of course, on our superb public transport system that gets you where you want to go, when you want to go, in the easiest way and shortest possible time span.
Or then again you could go and live on the Continent...:-)
|
|
I hear New Zealand is a really nice place.
|
|
The friends I know there inform me it is absolutely stunning...:-)
|
Or then again you could go and live on the Continent...:-)
were you thinking of France or Belgium, where tax is about 45% of GDP? (as aginst ~40% in the uk)
Or maybe Denmark, where it's nearer 50%?
|
No, just somewhere that doesn't have a Chancellor, government or local council that wants to take money out of my pocket in every which way possible or every time I stop my car and park it for more than a few seconds on roads that millions of motorists have paid for over many years already.
Food, drink and other necessities are, incidentally, a lot cheaper on the Continent - it's a question of swings and roundabouts.
Don't get me wrong, I love the UK to bits and am always glad to get back to it, but it's not called Rip-Off Britain for nothing.
|
>> Or then again you could go and live on the Continent...:-) were you thinking of France or Belgium, where tax is about 45% of GDP? (as aginst ~40% in the uk) Or maybe Denmark, where it's nearer 50%?
there is one important difference... they pay that much tax and it's all upfront and in your face.
Here, it's stealth tax after stealth tax after stealth tax
|
There's a difference in attitude between the two. It's called "honesty".
Sadly HMG already has a lot of form in this area.
|
EVERY pound you earn and spend eventually ends up in Gordon Brown's pocket.
The problem is that whilst I'm careful on what I spend my money because I have so little of it, he doesn't have the same problem....
Hence the waste at all levels and the constant need to keep topping up the tax revenues.
As Richard Littlejohn would say: "You couldn't make it up."
|
there is one important difference... they pay that much tax and it's all upfront and in your face.
www.cfit.gov.uk/research/scot0122/02.htm includes a table comparing overall motor taxation across Europe: UK was roughly in the middle in year 2000
The taxes are collected in very different ways: which is more stealthy depends on which taxes you watch most :)
e.g. Ireland more expensive overall: cheaper fuel, but pay to renew driving licence every few years, and up to 1300Euro road tax (3-litre+ car), or 500euro for 2-litre car. (UK maximum road tax £165)
Or France: cheaper fuel, but marginally more expensive overall. Any takers for motorway tolls? ;-)
|
|
I driven many times in France - you can avoid motorway tolls by using the equally excellent alternative roads and, what's more, see a lot less traffic.
|
|
I'm a taker for French motorway tolls. Love them. You have the roads all to yourself. Poop poop!
|
Oh yes.
M6 toll here I come. Wide open tarmac.............
{just mind out for the Chief Constables speeding past!)
|
Supposed to be miraculous. Just a pity that Ken didn't make London expensive enough to make any difference to us drivers.
Judging from the silence when I asked about it in IHAQ a fornight ago, BRers never have been up as far North as beyond Birmingham.
|
Birmingham isn't in the North. Not by a long chalk!
|
Irony my dear chap, making exactly that point. Which reminds me: Barnsley chops. That's what I call them (Cheshire born & bread). That's what a Northumbrian friend calls them. Scottish friend never heard of them (some sort of deprivation, I think). My suggestion that it must be a term used only in the Midlands seemed to offend everybody.
|
|
Naah. Yow mins Brummijum. Assa propa name.
|
Which reminds me: Barnsley chops.
If you mean the big double lamb chops then at least 2 Londoners call them that..
;)
|
|
To reach Birmingham from London you have to go North.....:-)
|
To reach Birmingham from London you have to go North.....:-)
And as all londoners know ... "It's grim up north" and who can argue that Birmingham isn't grim
JaB ;-)
|
Grim up north? You must be joking.
Birmingham, like any big city, has some delightful residential areas and - just exactly as with London - some grotty ones. On balance, London has the worst of the argument.
I live in the North West and like most parts of the northern part of Great Britain it has some stunning countryside and delightful towns and villages.
The main difference is, that just like motoring usually proving a joy again, life away from the capital is far more pleasant, people are more friendly, the cost of living is a fraction of the South East and, overall, anywhere outside the smug, self satisfied world of most Londoners is a far, far nicer place to be.
Harking back to Birmingham, it's also surrounded by some superb countryside and you can go in any direction from the centre to find it.
|
|
I have to say, I didn't enjoy the year I spent living in Birmingham at all, but then I'm from the North-West, so anywhere was going to seem bad by comparison ;)
|
Grim up north? You must be joking.
;-) you got me.... my tongue was firmly in my cheek...
JaB
|
It's amazing how parochial Londoners can be.
I live outside Stoke, within 20 minutes drive of the Peak National Park, and with loads of quiet country roads. My brother in law used to live in Wickford, Essex and his stories of the jams on the Arterial road were amazing.
James May keeps his Bentley 7 miles from home (in a lock up?) he wrote. In London a garage is a very expensive luxury. Here it is commonplace. I am fortunate having garaging for 3 cars and parking for 15 plus.
Of course you must live where you can work. I am fortunate but when I read James May's articles, I wonder how much real driving he does (except when he bought a Mini on Ebay from a place near us (can't remember where) and drove home.. and enjoyed it. Brave man!). Driving in London cannot be enjoyable.
madf
|
I live outside Stoke
thank your lucky stars you don't live in Stoke, or up'anley duck ;-)
|
I'm a lapsed Londoner, I live in the country now ;)
Driving in London stopped be fun a very long time ago.
|
|
No, it just stops every morning at 6.30am.
|
|
The fun or the traffic? (or both?)
|
Driving in London has always been a nightmare - even in the sixties.
I had a job which entailed driving from home (Pratts Bottom, Kent, at the time) to Harrow.It used to take me just over an hour using all the back doubles I perforce learned. Now I doubt I could do the trip in three hours!
Even if I was working there is no way I would work in London - horrible place!
Roger in Spain
|
|
All (and I mean ALL) the main roads into and out of London have been reduced to a single carriageway in each direction by bus lanes and on other roads bus laybys have been filled in so that every time a bus pulls up everything comes to a standstill.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
