OK when will people wake up and realise that there is a bigger picture here. You cannot argue that petrol prices are too high without looking at the whole taxation issue. The portion of the price of petrol that is not tax varies with the price of crude oil and you can't blame petrol companies or the government for that.

The other portion of the price of petrol is tax, decided by the government. Now, the government has a budget each year. The chancellor works out how much they need to spend on roads, schooling, the NHS, public services etc. and these need paying for somehow. They are paid for by taxes, whether it be income tax, VAT or petrol tax. All these add up to cover the costs of the government running all these public services. Now if they reduced the tax on petrol then they wouldn't have enough money to pay for the public services so they'd have to increase taxation elsewhere.

The main argument people are making for lower petrol prices is saying we have among the highest petrol prices in Europe. So what, our income tax is amongst the lowest in Europe but you don't hear people complaining about that. The only area where I do think the government need to make changes is with industries which rely heavily on petrol for their business, mainly haulage companies and farmers. Haulage companies are facing competition from our European neighbours who are stocking up on fuel in Europe and then coming over to the UK to take business away from British haulage companies.

During the last petrol shortage the country came to an almost complete standstill. Businesses were hit badly, people started panic buying food, stock piling food like there was a war on and yet people want us to go through this all again! MADNESS!! I don't have a problem with petrol prices but even if I did I wouldn't support the blockades for a few reasons. Firstly the government didn't budge last time, why should they this time? Secondly, they are be
tter prepared for it this time. And lastly we're just shooting ourselves in the foot by supporting the blockades. We are the ones suffering because of this, not the government or the petrol companies.

Already before the next set of blockades people are beginning to panic again, filling up on petrol unnecessarily. Stations are already running out and there aren't even any blockades yet. When will people wake up and realise that we are not as bad off as we like to make out.