Fuel Prices

Richard Fuller Excerpts

Thursday 13th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)]

My hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) is the driver’s friend. For many years, people who drive cars doubted whether any Member of the House—particularly Labour Members—favoured what they did in their daily lives, so it must be a tremendous joy for them to have my hon. Friend in the House. He is not just the driver’s friend: as we have seen today, he is a friend of families on low incomes, of business, of growth, and of people who live in towns and the country alike. This issue affects us all, so I add my voice to his, and to those who have congratulated him on securing this debate.

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry), who mentioned his local newspaper, I would like to congratulate my local newspaper, Times and Citizen, in Bedfordshire, which has been running a campaign supporting fairer fuel prices in my local town since the beginning of this year. People are incredulous that local petrol prices can vary so much between communities. One of my constituents, Tipu Zaman, said:

“I travel to Stevenage every day and have not bought petrol in Bedford for around seven months. On the way there and back I pass about four or five petrol stations and all of them charge less than the stations in Bedford.”

How can that be true?

It is important to recognise that the campaign of my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow has already made progress by having the OFT start to look for evidence to support an investigation. There has been much speculation about the potential manipulation of the markets. I would be shocked if those markets had been rigged, but let us not forget that only a few months ago we were all shocked at allegations of rigging in the LIBOR market. To restore people’s trust in markets, it is important that the OFT investigates.

I ask the Minister to talk with his colleagues about another matter that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) mentioned. The issue of competition has changed since 1998. One of the issues, seen in groceries as well, is a shift in power from retail choice to logistics strength—large supermarket chains using their logistics strength to move into new markets and reduce competition. That is an important issue for the OFT to investigate.

Finally, will the Minister also learn lessons from the US experience? The Federal Trade Commission writes on its website:

“Oil and gasoline are commodities that are critical to American consumers, so the Federal Trade Commission devotes significant resources to make sure that these markets remain competitive, using all the powers at its disposal to protect consumers from anticompetitive conduct”.

Will he ensure that the Government show that they understand the importance of this issue?