The Freight Transport Association has urged chancellor George Osborne to go further than freezing fuel duty, and cut it by three pence per litre.
FTA made the request in its pre-Budget submission to the Chancellor, who will deliver the 2014 Budget statement on 19 March.
It says that by reducing road fuel duty, the government would ease cost pressure on domestic freight activity, in turn stimulating economic growth.
“The issue of high fuel prices has not gone away, and there are still constraints on growth and economic expansion,” said FTA managing director of policy and communications, James Hookham.
“The Chancellor would give a real boost to balancing the economy by reducing fuel duty be 3p per litre.FTA’s research shows he would get his money back through higher tax receipts as trade improved and jobs increased.”
The association also called on the chancellor re-instate the duty differential for used cooking oil as a bio-fuel in commercial vehicles, within its submission.
“With the renewed focus on changes in the climate and the need to reduced greenhouse gas emissions, FTA calls on the chancellor to recognise the small but measurable contribution that the recycling of used cooking oil can make by converting it into bio-diesel,” added Hookham.
“Reinstating a lower duty rate will make this process financially, as well as environmentally sustainable.”
* The FTA welcomed the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement announcement last year, that the fuel duty increase due to take effect in September 2014 had been cancelled.
It has since continued work with FairFuelUK on the issue of fuel duty.
