Osborne hits back at OPEC chief in petrol prices row

Chancellor George Osborne has refused to take the blame for rising petrol prices – rejecting claims by world oil producers that taxes were responsible.

Mr Osborne said drivers in the UK were “paying the price” for rising oil prices and Downing Street said “non-tax factors” were mostly driving the cost at the pump.

He hit back after the secretary general of oil-producing cartel OPEC, Abdullah al-Badri, told drivers to “blame your government” if they were unhappy at paying more to fill their tanks.

“Don’t blame OPEC, blame your government. It’s not because of the price of oil; it’s because of taxes,” said the head of the body, which represents 40 per cent of world oil production.

Prices hit record levels again this week despite a fall in wholesale costs which the AA pointed out had seen pump prices fall in other European countries such as France and Germany.

On February 1, the average UK price for petrol was 128.65p per litre, with diesel at 133.38p.

That has helped sustain pressure on Mr Osborne to cancel a 1p duty rise due in April.

The Chancellor repeated his pledge to examine that option and said the Government continued to look into the introduction of a “stabiliser” mechanism to iron out big price fluctuations.

“Oil prices around the world have gone up a lot in recent months and you see that in many countries and, of course, unfortunately British drivers are paying the price for that at the petrol pump,” Mr Osborne said when asked about the OPEC chief’s comments.

“We want to see concerted international action to try and get the oil price down and the G20 (the group of the world’s leading industrial nations) is looking at that,” he added during a visit to a high-tech manufacturing firm in Cheltenham.