UK petrol and diesel prices: unleaded rose by record 16.59p in June

Mike Rutherford

Petrol saw a record monthly price rise in June 2022, with the average UK pump price increasing by 16.59p per litre over 30 days. Diesel also increased by 15.62p per litre in the same period, according to RAC Fuel Watch.

The average pump price of unleaded is now 191.43ppl, compared with 145.55ppl at the start of the year. The cost of filling a typical family car’s 55-litre fuel tank with petrol has gone from £80.05 on 3 January to £109.29 today.

As for diesel, the average pump price has risen from 148.75ppl to 199.05ppl per litre this year, with the cost of filling up rocketing from £81.81 to £105.29.

The wholesale cost of oil increased throughout May leading to higher petrol and diesel prices at the pumps. However, wholesale costs have been falling for five consecutive weeks, with retailers failing to pass their newfound savings on to drivers. As such, RAC analysis suggests retailers are now taking an average margin of 12ppl – double their usual long-term margin of 6ppl.

The RAC is calling on retailers to cut pump prices in line with wholesale costs. The organisation also wants the Government to either temporarily cut fuel duty significantly or reduce VAT on fuel. Duty and VAT currently account for 85p (44 per cent) of the 191.43p average cost of a litre of petrol, and 86p (43 per cent) of the 199.05p cost of diesel.

RAC fuel spokesman Simon Williams said: “The rate at which pump prices have been rising over the last four weeks is hard to comprehend. Not a day in June went by when petrol prices didn’t go up, even though the price retailers pay to buy in fuel went down. There’s no doubt that drivers are getting an incredibly raw deal at the pumps at a time when the cost of living crisis is being felt ever more acutely.

“The silence from the Treasury when it comes to supporting drivers through this time of record high pump prices is, frankly, deafening. Perhaps it has something do with the fact that it’s benefitting significantly from the increased VAT revenue caused by the high prices. In fact, despite cutting duty by 5p a litre to 53p, the Treasury is still collecting the same revenue per litre now due to the higher VAT take making up for the duty cut.

“In March, fuel duty was 58p a litre and VAT amounted to 27p; now duty is 53p and VAT on every litre equates to 32p, making for the same 85p a litre total. Things are all the more galling for drivers when you consider that VAT is applied on top of everything else – duty, the cost of the fuel, delivery and retailer margin – making it a tax on a tax.

“We badly need the Government to go beyond just vague words and instead actually implement a clear package of financial support to show they’re on the side of drivers.”

Fuel retailers are to be investigated after accusations that the 5p-per-litre fuel duty cut was pocketed instead of being passed on to consumers.

Business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng wrote to the boss of the Competition and Markets Authority, asking for an independent review to be carried out into the matter, requesting an initial report to be delivered by 7 July.

The AA said it was “pleased” by the move, but argued that “more urgent action is needed”. The organisation’s head of roads policy, Jack Cousens, called for a 10p cut to fuel duty and for longer-term transparency on pump pricing – as is provided in Northern Ireland – to be offered in the rest of the UK.

Retailers hit back at the news, though, claiming to have been “unfairly scapegoated” for the price rises and arguing that the 5p saving had been passed on. Gordon Balmer, executive director of the Petrol Retailers Association, commented: “The briefings provided by Government spokespeople to the media indicate that ministers do not understand how fuel prices are set. We have contacted the secretary of state for business on multiple occasions offering to meet and explain fuel pricing. However, we are yet to receive a response.”

Russia is one of the world’s largest producers of oil and gas, so any disruptions to its production processes has a global impact.

With Russia having launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine and facing international sanctions, there’s potential for significant disruption to supplies. Russia produces 4.5 million barrels of oil each day, and only Saudi Arabia produces more.

The sanctions levied against Russia so far have targeted banks and oligarchs rather than the country’s energy sector, but factors such as Germany’s postponement of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline will have an effect on the energy market overall. Russia also has the ability to reduce oil exports to Europe in a tit-for-tat response to economic sanctions, and experts suggest Saudi Arabian oil fields could struggle to increase production sufficiently to counter such measures.

“Opec, the oil producers’ cartel, is already struggling to meet its output targets as demand for crude rebounds following the easing of lockdown restrictions. This has pushed up prices, with analysts warning there is limited capacity to increase supplies if flows from Russia are affected by sanctions,” the Financial Times newspaper has reported.

The price of fuel can be divided into three sections; the taxes imposed by the Government, the costs of drilling, refining and transporting, and the profit margins for the fuel companies.

For petrol, diesel and bioethanols, the Government gets around 65 per cent of the overall cost through fuel duty and value added tax (VAT). The fuel duty represents the fixed price of fuel – it stays the same regardless how much overall oil prices fluctuate. Currently, the Treasury adds 57.95 pence to each litre of fuel through fuel duty, and another 20 per cent through VAT. How much you pay in VAT depends on how much fuel you purchase.

The second biggest chunk comes from the wholesale costs of the fuel itself. The wholesale cost is a combination of currency exchange rates, global oil prices, and even domestic supply and demand.

Experts predict high fuel costs will be with us for the foreseeable future, and it’s not just down to the crisis in Ukraine – energy costs have been high for the best part of a year already as demand surged as the world emerged from lockdown.

Part of the problem is down to the fact that relatively low barrel prices in recent years have put plans to drill for new reserves on hold. That’s true in Africa, the US and South America, and while the current high prices may increase interest in exploring new reserves, it can take years for new wells to come on stream in volumes required to affect the market.

Supermarket forecourts usually offer the cheapest fuel prices and this is because of the market power supermarkets hold. Companies like Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons are all in competition with one another, so they keep fuel prices as low as possible hoping that when motorists come to fill their tank, they might do their weekly grocery shopping, too. 

There are persistent rumours that supermarket fuel contains fewer additives and is of lesser quality than fuel from traditional forecourts, but there’s little hard evidence of this. All fuel sold in the UK has to abide by the standards set in the Motor Fuel Regulation. 

Motorway fuel stations argue the reason their prices are higher is that many of them are open 24 hours a day and offer more services than a regular forecourt. Motorway fuel stations also pay high rent prices for the buildings they operate.

In more remote areas, fuel is often more expensive because of the higher transport and supply costs, but according to RAC fuel spokesman Simon Williams, this doesn’t apply to motorway stations: “We can see no reason why motorway fuel should be so much more expensive. In fact, arguably it is much easier from a delivery point of view than it is getting fuel to urban filling stations.”

Although diesel and petrol are taxed the same by the Treasury, historically diesel has been more expensive than petrol, as domestic refineries have struggled to meet demand. This has forced the UK to import diesel from other countries at a greater rate than petrol. In addition, diesel prices are pushed up by the cost of the additives that go into the fuel.

Furthermore, the gap between UK petrol and diesel prices widens during the winter. The end of the US “driving season” means retailers have a surplus of petrol they can’t export, so they sell it here at a lower price. Diesel demand, meanwhile, increases across continental Europe, where the fuel is commonly used in heating oil.

Recently, the influx of cheap diesel from countries like Saudi Arabia has turned the tide, swinging diesel wholesale prices closer to that of petrol, and bringing the pump price down with it. However the fact that we get a higher percentage of diesel from Russia than petrol means the advantage has swung the other way again.

What’s your view on fuel prices in the UK? Do we pay too much for our petrol and diesel? What would you do about it? Join the debate in our comments section below…