Recently I have received several enquiries from Eddisbury constituents about petrol price setting at the pumps. 

As a motorist, it can be hugely frustrating to find wildly different per litre prices within the same town - let alone county - without any apparently justifiable reason.

It is also exasperating when falls in oil prices do not seem to be passed on to consumers quickly, if at all.

It is ultimately the responsibility of individual retailers to set petrol prices, taking a host of different factors into account.

To shine a light on this, the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero tracks average retail petrol and diesel prices, and publishes them online.

In May 2022, the Government wrote to fuel retailers calling on them to do everything possible to ensure drivers get a fair deal.

But the Secretary of State subsequently had cause to write to Dr Andrea Coscelli CBE - the chief executive of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) - requesting an urgent review of the road fuel market, following concerns drivers weren’t receiving a fair deal at the pumps here in Cheshire, or elsewhere across the country.

The CMA review that followed found the gap between wholesale and retail prices has not significantly contributed to the overall rise in pump prices.

The CMA also noted that 2022 was the most volatile year for fuel prices since reliable records began, that the gap between diesel and petrol prices has become more prominent than ever reliably recorded, and that prices vary widely between local areas where there are few competitors nearby particularly where there is no local supermarket petrol station.

More broadly, the CMA concluded the market for retail fuel in the UK appears quite competitive compared to other countries.

Local variations in the price of road fuel - including pricing disparities between urban and rural areas, like ours - may reflect the fact that these sites supply lower fuel volumes and higher transportation costs, whilst not being able to benefit from economies of scale.

However - and significantly - the CMA’s Road Fuel Market Study did note that competition in the retail fuel sector has weakened since 2019.

Following the completion of that study, the CMA is now seeking to establish compulsory open data requirements and a new ‘fuel monitor’ oversight body.

This body would observe prices and profit margins on an ongoing basis. At present, retailers only provide information on prices at our local petrol stations themselves, making it hard for drivers to compare prices - thus weakening competition.

Such an oversight body would need to be underpinned by legislation, which I would strongly support on behalf of my Eddisbury constituents.