The boss of Scotland’s biggest independent courier company has added his voice to the growing calls for a drop in prices at the diesel pump.
Anger has been growing that motorists have seen at most a six per cent reduction in fuel prices despite the plummeting cost of oil, which has dropped by 25% in just six months.
With more than a 100-strong fleet, Eagle Couriers acutely feels every change in diesel prices. Even a 1p rise in fuel costs adds 60p to the cost of every fill up for the firm’s vehicles.
That means that after years of rising petrol and diesel prices, the company has seen its annual costs swell.
Eagle Couriers are affected by every change in fuel price
Jerry Stewart, one of the directors at Eagle Couriers, which has its HQ in Bathgate, West Lothian and substantial bases in both Edinburgh and Glasgow said:
“We have had to take it on the chin for years while the price of diesel has been on a relentless path upwards.
“The costs for companies like ours have been difficult but there is absolutely nothing we can do to influence the cost of a barrel of crude. We have been helpless onlookers as it has steadily crept up.
“So of course we feel a sense of relief when the prices of a barrel of oil starts to drop – and would clearly expect to see that reflected in the prices at the pump.
“Don’t get me wrong, even the five or six percent reduction in fuel prices we have seen is very welcome, but having shouldered the rises for so long we’d like to see the reductions more closely match the drop in the price of crude.
“I think that is the expectation of every motorist in the country, as well haulage and courier companies like ours. I think the oil companies would do well to pay attention to the anger this is causing.”
Oil has fallen from approximately £72 to £53 per barrel since June, a decline of about a quarter. In comparison, diesel prices in the UK over that period have fallen from a high of around 136.37p to 128.58p – a decline of only 5%.
George Osborne will be monitoring prices at the pump
The Chancellor, George Osborne, has said the government will be watching petrol and diesel distributors “very carefully” to ensure they pass on oil price reductions to customers.
However, Campaigners argue that taxes account for the bulk of UK pump prices, and that the government therefore has more power to reduce prices than petrol companies.