Canberrans are being mugged at the fuel bowser every day of the week and it has been going on, unchecked, for decades.
Our noses are rubbed in this unpleasant truth every time we cross the border. Regardless where, the odds are that the price of fuel will be lower than what it was in the ACT.
The tiny town of Gunning, well under an hour north of Canberra, was five cents a litre cheaper than Canberra on January 15. On the same day Yass was 2.9 cents cheaper and even Queanbeyan, virtually a part of the ACT fuel market as far as motorists are concerned, was 1.2 cents a litre cheaper.
When compared to the NSW average fuel price on the same day all these centres were over the odds as well.
NSW, at 117.1 cents a litre was a whopping 27 cents a litre cheaper than Canberra’s 144.1 cents a litre.
Is there anybody, anywhere, who can explain why this must be so in a way that makes sense and uses terms most people can understand?
Every time the question is put to the fuel distributors and retailers their designated spokespeople respond with reams of gobbledegook.
The vice-like grip the Coles and Woolworths fuel duopoly has on the ACT market may have something to do with it, but is unlikely to be the only factor.
Canberra’s handful of independent retailers are usually cheaper at the bowser than the big end of town even after the so-called “loyalty discount” for supermarket card holders is factored in.
The ACT Government for one is happy to blame the whopping price disparity on “a lack of competition” with chief minister Andrew Barr dismissing it as an issue for the Federal Government, acting through the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, to fix.
Not everybody is convinced the Territory government can wash it hands of the matter however, with one country commuter telling The Canberra Times: “It (lack of competition) just sounds like a bad excuse”.
They may have a point. Petrol is almost always cheaper than Canberra in regional centres such as Albury-Wodonga, Wagga, Dubbo, Bathurst and Orange. The price disparity down the coast is, if anything, even more pronounced.
These regional communities all have far fewer bowsers, and all sell fuel in significantly lower volumes, than Canberra. How is it, despite this, they can consistently undercut the ACT price?
And, more to the point, what can be done to provide a better deal for Canberra’s motorists?
One option would appear to be a Fuel Watch scheme similar to that in operation in Western Australia where retailers must set their price for the next day, to take effect at 6am, by 2pm. These are then made public on the Fuel Watch website at 2.30pm.
Retailers who don’t set the lowest possible price run the risk of being priced out of the market by their competitors.
While this may not be the magic bullet that would give the ACT overnight parity with NSW fuel prices it would at least be a start and is worthy of consideration.
Extracted from The Canberra Times