PM’s fuel claim ignored new tax

AUCKLAND: Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s calculation of how much extra tax Kiwis are paying at the petrol pump on Monday did not include the recent excise tax or Auckland’s regional fuel tax.

National leader Simon Bridges said the Prime Minister has got this ‘‘badly wrong’’.

At a press conference on Monday, Ms Ardern said consumers were being ‘‘fleeced’’ at the petrol pump, blaming price increases on the increased margins of petrol companies.

Between October 27, 2017 and September 28 this year, petrol prices had risen 39c, according to Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) data and Ms Ardern said just 6.8c of that increase was due to ‘‘taxes and levies’’.

That 6.8c increase is made up of a 1.77c increase in emissions trading scheme (EST) taxes and 5.04c of GST over the same period, MBIE data shows.

But the 10calitre Auckland regional fuel tax and 3.5calitre fuel excise tax, introduced on September 30, were not included in the ‘‘taxes and levies’’ side of Ms Ardern’s equation.

In a statement to The New Zealand Herald, an MBIE spokeswoman said: ‘‘current methodology does not accommodate regional prices or regional fuel taxes’’ in their fuel price calculations.

‘‘Our current methodology does not accommodate regional prices or regional fuel taxes. We are developing a new methodology to replace our existing methodology that will include regional retail price differences in its measure.’’

The 3.5c excise tax came into effect on September 30 and the MBIE data Ms Ardern was referring to was taken from between September 2128, meaning it was not included in MBIE’s data either. — NZME