Fuel price gouging. War profiteering and government dissembling

While greedy fuel companies benefit from the war, politicians tell us how to deal with greedy fuel companies, but they don’t. Rex Patrick with story.

On March 4, five days after the first US bombs were dropped on Tehran, Chancellor of the Exchequer Jim Chalmers stood up in the House of Representatives during question time and answered a question from a Labor supporter, “Dorothy Dixer”, about the price of fuel. Answer:

“…I have written to the ACCC to ensure that service stations are not price gouging and defrauding Australian drivers and Australian consumers.”

MWM After giving it a few days, I contacted the ACCC to see what their plans were for reducing fuel prices. Meanwhile, after the Central Bank’s interest rate increase announcement, fuel prices increased faster than mortgage loan interest rates.

As it turned out, there was no letter and no plan to address the price gouging issue.

shipping delay

The Iranian war started on February 28. Crude oil leaving the UAE on February 27 had a journey time of 17 to 26 days to reach Australia, so it is conceivable that prices will not change much over the next 17 days.

Wishful thinking, the price of fuel rose almost immediately.

no plans

In response to a Freedom of Information request regarding the fuel cut-off policing plan, the ACCC said: The requested document is not available!

ACCC Freedom of Information Response

Did they ignore the Treasurer?

If the ACCC had been inclined to ignore the Treasurer, they should have noted that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese stood up in the House of Representatives on 23 March and said:

“That’s why our government is taking action with Australia’s fuel security plan, putting an end to price gouging, securing fuel supplies for Australian industry and households through the ACCC’s actions.”

Or maybe they heard the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Senator Penny Wong, say in the Senate on the same day as the Prime Minister:

“Therefore, the government is taking action to secure fuel supplies for Australian industry and households, guarding against price inflation and working to mitigate the effects of increases in global energy prices.”

Or Industry Minister Time Ayres comes right after him and tells the Senate:

We oppose increases in gasoline prices.

It is hard to imagine how ministers thought it would be appropriate to say this. The price of diesel in Melbourne on 23 March, when pre-war ships were still arriving at our terminals, was $2.88 per litre, a 77% increase on pre-war prices. At the time of this writing, it was $3.20.

No power to take action

On 25 March the Treasurer announced: Draft Law on Amendments to Treasury Laws (Doubling Penalties for ACCC Implementation) Draft. As the name of the bill suggests, penalties for certain market abuses under national competition law are doubled.

While everyone in ‘Labor’ was selling this as an ‘anti-price gouging bill’, Senator Nick McKim stood up in the Senate on March 26 and ‘called out the cat’:

“Minister, I just want to see if you are prepared to risk your credibility and join the Treasurer, Mr Chalmers, the Government Leader in the Senate, Senator Wong, and Minister Ayres in arguing that this bill is aimed at price gouging in the fuel sector. The reason I am interested in this is that we in the Greens have a very strong view that both Minister Ayres and Minister Wong are misleading the Senate by claiming that this bill is aimed at price gouging and exactly why.” I want to explain.

“This bill doubles the penalties for existing provisions in Australia’s competition and consumer law. These existing provisions are things that make misleading or deceptive conduct, cartel conduct and other things illegal, but do not actually make price gouging illegal. Anyone who is an expert in this field – I would include Professor Allan Fels – will tell you that there is no provision in Australian law that makes price gouging illegal, other than the provision last year that made price gouging illegal. The supermarket industry.

“My question to you, Minister, is if the current consumer law in Australia is so inadequate that you need to introduce something that would make price gouging in the supermarket sector illegal, how can you actually argue that existing laws are aimed at price gouging in the rest of the economy?”

In other words, although the bill would double penalties for unlawful conduct,

Price inflating is not considered against the law.

The bill passed both Houses that day as the price of diesel in Melbourne rose above $3 per liter.

deceptive behavior

Following a National Cabinet meeting on 30 March, Anthony Albanese announced he would halve fuel duty on petrol and diesel for three months, saying: “Halfing fuel duty will reduce the cost of fuel by 26.3 cents per litre.”

The price of diesel in Melbourne that day was almost at the same level as today.

I don’t think there is much trust in our fuel supply companies right now. And there is definitely not much trust in some of our ministers. All we car enthusiasts have to do is visit a gas station to learn the ugly truth.

ACCC Additional Note

The ACCC sent a ‘no plans’ FOI response to MWM on 7 April.

Someone must have read it and thought about it after a good night’s sleep; He didn’t look that good.

Two days later they sent an unsolicited email to MWM stating that they were monitoring the incident, holding meetings, alerting fuel companies, and issuing both reports and media statements.

They also drew ours Note a study they conducted into the unavailability of diesel to independent wholesalers and distributors serving regional and rural Australia.

There is no investigation regarding the reduction of fuel prices. As we know, there are no plans to approach this issue.

Despite the ceasefire, fuel prices are not expected to drop rapidly

Rex Patrick is a former South Australian Senator and formerly a submariner in the armed forces. Known as an anti-corruption and transparency warrior, Rex is also known as “Transparency Warrior“