Tasmania’s peak motoring body is calling for legislation to make it compulsory for fuel retailers to report their prices at the bowser in an effort to fight rising costs.
The RACT has been lobbying the State Government to take action on fuel, but to date the measures put in place have been ineffective.
RACT Executive General Manager, Membership and Community Stacey Pennicott says Tasmanians have been paying too much for fuel for too long.
“We have been lobbying the State Government for some time to take action on fuel, but to date the measures put in place, such as the GasBuddy app, have been ineffective. It is time for government-led, centralised real-time fuel price information to be made available to the public.”
She says this would involve retailers being required to share their pricing, as well as all levels of government actively monitoring prices to address unjustifiable and excessive differences.
Ms Pennicott says RACT had written multiple times to the government in relation to fuel prices, but action to date had been insufficient.
The call comes as the Australian Automobile Association today released its quarterly Affordability Index, which shows Hobart is again the least affordable city when transport costs are considered as a percentage of the average income.
The report also shows that the annual cost of transport in Launceston increased by $422 per year compared to the previous quarter.
For both cities, the rise was mainly attributed to car loan repayments and the cost of fuel.
The report shows that Hobart households were paying an extra $199 per year for fuel, while Launceston residents were paying $264 more per household each year.
“Launceston has been ranked in the top three highest weekly fuel prices of all regional cities since regional monitoring started in the second quarter of 2017,” she said.
Extracted from Chilli FM