Rising oil price drives increases at the pumps
The pump price of petrol is now at its highest level in two years.
According to weekly figures from the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy the average price in the UK is currently 117.9p per litre. The last time it was at these levels was back in December 2014.
The average price of diesel is 120.35p per litre, an 18-month high.
(All the headline numbers are contained in the RAC Foundation’s weekly fuel fact sheet.)
RAC Foundation analysis shows that the cost of filling an average car is now £11 higher for diesel and £9 higher for petrol than at the 12-month low point for pump prices which was recorded in early February last year.
Steve Gooding, director of the RAC Foundation, said:
“For the seventeen million people or so who commute by car the return to work will have come with a nasty surprise. With pump prices up again, the cost of an average tank of fuel is around £10 more today than it was a year ago.
“Transport is the biggest area of household expenditure and many drivers will be asking the same question as those rail travellers just hit by big fare increases: at what point does the journey to work start looking like it just isn’t worth it?”
The rise in pump prices partly reflects of a jump in the cost of oil which for Brent crude has jumped from around $26 a barrel in January 2016 to $55 now.
ENDS
Contact:
Philip Gomm – Head of External Communications – RAC Foundation
[email protected] | 020 7747 3445 | 07711 776448 | 020 7389 0601 (ISDN)
Notes to editors:
The RAC Foundation is a transport policy and research organisation that explores the economic, mobility, safety and environmental issues relating to roads and their users.
The Foundation publishes independent and authoritative research with which it promotes informed debate and advocates policy in the interest of the responsible motorist. All the Foundation’s work is available at: www.racfoundation.org
More fuel related charts are to be found in the data section of the website: www.racfoundation.org/data