Chancellor Rishi Sunak told hiking fuel duty will hurt NHS while it fights coronavirus
TORY MPs warned the Chancellor that hiking fuel duty in the Budget will hurt the NHS while it is under strain dealing with the coronavirus outbreak.
They said ending the fuel duty freeze, which would add 2p per litre to petrol and diesel, would increase the cost of transportation for ambulances and other key NHS vehicles.
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Senior Tory MP Robert Halfon warned: “They would be giving with one hand and taking away with the other.”
His warning came as he led a delegation of colleagues delivering a letter signed by 36 Tory MPs urging Rishi Sunak to ditch any plans to hike fuel duty in Wednesday's Budget.
And the FairFuelUK campaign handed in a petition signed by 134,000 motorists against the move.
There are also fears that the Chancellor will use plunging oil prices triggered by the coronavirus outbreak as a cover to hike fuel duty.
The RAC has predicted that petrol prices could fall by up to 10p after the price of a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, reached around 35.50 US dollars just before midday yesterday following Saudi Arabia and Russia’s falling-out over attempts to control production.
FairFuelUK founder Howard Cox warned: “On the eve of the Budget, the fledgling Chancellor, seeing oil prices nosedive, could immorally punish the world’s highest taxed drivers with a hike in Fuel Duty.
“The omnipresent power of the Prime Minister’s green tinged virtue signalling special advisers is rumoured to be clouding his economic judgement.
'MAJOR CHALLENGE'
“A 2p increase in this levy will not save the planet. Disguising such a tax increase as a benefit to the environment will be both underhand and reprehensible.
"Mr Sunak, please have the mettle of George Osborne's 2011 Budget and cut this degenerative tax to keep UK Plc flourishing post Brexit.”
Mr Halfon added: “Our message to the Chancellor is that the economy is facing a major challenge in coronavirus.
“We should be helping ordinary folk and businesses, not hammering them with fuel duty charges.
“Don’t forget, the NHS is going to need a lot of extra money to deal with this kind of virus.
“What’s the point though if you then put up fuel duty? Then the NHS will have to pay more as well because of the cost of transportation, ambulances and all that sort of thing.
“They would be giving with one hand and taking away with the other.”
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Tory MP Jamie Wallis told The Sun: “It’s important we back British business, our haulage businesses and I think it’s important that we keep costs down for consumers in my Bridgend constituency.”
Stoke-on-Trent North MP Jonathan Gullis said: “It would do huge damage to the haulage industry which exists in Stoke-on-Trent and the surrounding area and tradesmen as well who drive around in their white vans working incredibly hard to provide essential services from fixing things to taking people around the city and we can’t allow that situation to happen so I hope this will be taken on board.”
Senior Tories such as former party leader Iain Duncan Smith, ex-Brexit secretary David Davis and ex-transport secretary Chris Grayling were also among the signatories to the letter.
The Sun says
JUST a thought as the oil price nose-dives: Can we have cheaper petrol now?
Or is there some new excuse for why a 27 per cent fall WON’T mean lower pump prices?
We all know what would have happened if they’d risen 27 per cent.
And that would have been instant.
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