A Fuel Duty Rise was omitted from Jeremy Hunt’s first speech as Chancellor of the Exchequer yesterday.
New Chancellor of the Exchequer took to the national stage yesterday to deliver his Autumn Statement. Whilst lowered tax brackets and support not in keeping with the rise of inflation took centre stage, hidden in the background was a potentially catastrophic rise in Fuel Duty, with a record raise of 12p per litre.
This enormous hike is reported to be taking place in March 2023 but was excluded from the Chancellor’s main speech.
MoneyMagpie’s founder and TV journalist Jasmine Birtles reminds us all that, “The devil really is in the detail. Anyone who sat through the whole of the Chancellor’s speech on Thursday would have gone away none the wiser about a major tax that he is planning for us all in March 2023. You had to pick out the facts and figures in the written material that came out after the speech itself to find out that the Government is going to raise fuel duty by 23% in March 2023. This is a nightmare. Not only will it mean penury and job loss for people who depend on their vehicles for work, but it will, yet again, increase prices across the board as nearly everything we consume has to be transported.
“This is a Chancellor who says he wants to get us back on the road to recovery but, behind the scenes, is making sure we can’t afford to drive down that road!
“Everyone – MPs on both sides, the media, the trades unions and the voters – need to hold the Chancellor to account over this appalling and sneaky decision, and demand that he reverse it. Otherwise, if we allow this hike to go through, the economy has no hope of recovery.”
Yesterday’s report from the Office for Budget Responsiblity “anticipated that Hunt would raise the tax on petrol and diesel by 23% in March”, reversing the 5p/litre temporary cut made by Rishi Sunak.
But Hunt told broadcasters this morning that a decision hasn’t been made, saying:
“Let me clear that up, that is not government policy.
We will make a decision on that at the next budget in the Spring.
That was just an assumption that the OBR made – they’re an independent organisation, they make assumptions.
We have made no decision on that at all.”
We now wait with bated breath to see what he decides.
