Bob
I saw this story too and it reminded me of the nineties. Nice to know we can still rely on the Tories to score some own goals as well as our lot. But I wonder how much space the right-wing blogs will devote to these unwelcome revelations? Guido is delighted to leap on Labour transgressions but is less censorious if they are on the other side of the fence.

Reminded of the old adage "People in Glasshouses etc".
Make you wonder what else might crawl out from under where this lot came from.

I have just filled my car up at the local tesco. Thanks gordon. I hope this comes to haunt you.

How can you labour bloggers defend this coninual exploitation?

£1.22 a litre and dear knows percentage what to prudence.

Bye for ever labour party.

Seeing as Ministers are disbarred by law for accepting money in this way from 'interested parties', does this mean that these Tory shadows cannot take up the same office if they were to win the next General Election?

Or is it just illegal to buy a Minister after an election, but legal to do it beforehand?

stevie... which political party are you going to vote for then? And what are their promises on fuel duty?

Bob:

I am going to vote Tory of course. Isn`t everyone?

I do not care what their policy on fuel is. I know labour have had enough time in power and should have seen all this coming.

Thought as much, stevie. You're going to vote Tory because of high fuel prices that will remain high under a Tory government should they be elected.

Because you are concerned about how much you are paying for fuel... but you don't care what their policies on fuel prices are.

Pure genius! With that stupid logic you partly explain why the Tories have been out of power for over 11 years... because no-one knows what they are for.

Bob. Unlike Stevie I can't afford to fill up my tank, even for my little 1200cc car. But you would never believe that petrol was expensive judging by the amount of mini and monster size vehicles that cut me up in their frantic rush to overtake me as I drive within the fuel economy/speed limit. If motorists spent more time preserving their fuel and less time spouting whining hot air through their exhausts, there'd be a whole lot less to complain about.
And Stevie, point me in the direction of the Tory policy on fuel. Labour did take off the Tory fuel escalator - but you know that already. Next you'll be telling us that paying a couple of quid more at the supermarket has brought you to the verge of insolvency and you've been a Labour voter all your life.

Fuel duty policy per se does not matter so much. Fuel price rises are only a major issue in the context of universal belt-squeezing (apart from in the public sector of course)- i.e. reduced disposable incomes- brought on in part by the global credit crisis, but also Britain's economic mismanagement under Labour. The tories don't need to specifically pledge to reduce fuel duty, they simply need to restrain wasteful public spending (note- wasteful only!) and introduce some genuine 'prudence' to the treasury, to make people more able to fill their tanks.

Er, I seem to have written another paragraph..

Labour have had ten years with Britain's public finances and economy: the former they've stuffed so full of debt they could barely waddle around another crisis if they tried; the latter they've prodded into missing inflation targets. Debt means more tax, which means less money to fill your tank, and so does inflation (effectively). The problem is far, far, from being simply to do with fuel duty.

Lectures from the Party of double digit inflation, 3 million unemployed, record house repossessions... boy are we grateful the OPEC countries didn't put up the price of oil.

Still, perhaps we could use so more domestic fuel. Whatever happened to all those 'uneconomic' pits?

Is that the same party that laid the foundations for the economy's last decade of merriment?

I wouldn't be quite so bullish on inflation, repossessions and unemployment - after all RPI inflation is now higher than at any time since 1992, repossessions are at their highest since, um, 1992 and there are over 5 million people on out of work benefits.

Just because it's a statistic doesn't mean it's helpful.