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Finance Bill

In that case, I look forward to the fair alcohol stabiliser that the Conservatives will no doubt introduce in due course when the core ingredients of beer, for example, go up, as commodities do in the market place. Both the Conservatives and the Scottish nationalists are extremely coy about the downside of their proposals. I noticed that the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Stewart Hosie) said that the purpose of amendment 13 was to smooth spikes in oil prices. What he did not say—I can only infer that this must be the case—was that he would also smooth out the troughs: that is, that he would put prices up. Otherwise, he would not be smoothing out anything at all. There has to be a downside as well as an upside. The Conservative spokesman, using almost exactly the same language, said that his amendment would smooth out the bumps. That is the difference between the SNP and the Conservatives; the Conservatives deal with bumps, not spikes. Presumably, he would also smooth out the dips at the same time. My hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid), with characteristic diligence, has done some more research into the effects of Conservative party policy. I must admit that I look forward to the Conservatives distributing leaflets on the issue in my constituency—as Michael Ashcroft put so much money into their endeavours, they must be able to afford to do so. Let me run through the effect of their policy. This is not a party political point—it is central to amendment 11. According to the average UK fuel prices published on the AA website, at the time of last year's Budget, March 2008, a litre of unleaded petrol cost 106.8p. It cost 118.2p in June, when the House had the opportunity to vote on the Budget proposals. The price rose by 11.4p between the Budget and the vote in the House, which allowed the shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury to say that the fair fuel stabiliser would cut the cost of petrol by 5p a litre. However, with his characteristic generosity, my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute said that he had calculated the saving to the motorist of last summer's Conservative party policy at 5.7p a litre. That seemed very popular, and people asked me why the Liberal Democrats opposed the policy. They said that the rises in prices were extremely unpopular, and that the Conservatives seemed to have reached a brilliant conclusion. They seemed to know better than the market, and to have an electoral advantage in pursuing that option. Unfortunately—and this is the twist—petrol prices started to fall rather dramatically just as the Conservatives chained themselves to their policy. I am again indebted to the research done by my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute, who showed that the price of a litre of unleaded petrol had fallen, according to the AA website, to an average of 90.6p by March 2009. A fall of 16.2p since that year's Budget was dramatic enough, but the fall from the peak of the market was close to 30p. That peak roughly coincided with the period when the Tories were energetically championing the fair fuel stabiliser most energetically in this House. What would be the impact on motoring if amendment 11 were agreed to? I have done a calculation, and I am afraid to say—this will come as a shock to hon. Members across the Committee—that the amendment would impose a crippling rise in duty on every motorist in the country. The Conservatives may have keen environmental reasons for wanting to increase petrol prices so markedly but, if they do, I do not understand why they should be so coy about them. I hope that the hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire will tell us why his party is not selling the policy with vigour, because I am about to explain what its impact would be. As I said, at the time of last year's Budget, a litre of unleaded petrol cost 106.8p, but that had fallen to 90.6p by March 2009. If amendment 11 had been in operation at that time, it would have brought about an 8.1p increase in fuel duty. To be fair, the Government raised fuel duty by 2p in December 2008 and by a further 1.84p in April 2009, so it seems only reasonable to take those rises away from the figure that would otherwise form the basis of the calculation. If a provision equivalent to amendment 11 had been passed last year, motorists would have had to pay an extra 4.5p, approximately, for a litre of unleaded petrol over and above what they in fact have to pay at the pump at present. That would have been the impact of the Conservative amendment. One could call it smoothing out the bumps, or putting up the price of petrol for motorists across the country. The Scottish National party has a variant on that, and it is perfectly honourable for both parties to take that approach, but they should be explicit about their intentions.