John Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)

I propose to share time with Deputies Michael Healy-Rae and Timmy Dooley. I thank Deputy Dooley for tabling this Bill, which gives us the opportunity to discuss many of the issues raised with Deputies on all sides of the House in recent weeks. This week I met the farm contractors association, IFA members and the Irish Road Hauliers Association. All had the same concern - the increasing cost of petrol and diesel - and in many cases they claim the increases are practically putting them out of business.

The Bill would provide for an immediate reduction in the excise duty on petrol and diesel of 4 cent per litre. Adding VAT to this amounts to a 5% reduction, which would be of major benefit to families travelling to work and bringing their children to school. In recent weeks, we have seen a reduction in the number of people attending GAA games. I do not blame the Minister for the whole problem but the cost of fuel and the high admission prices charged by the GAA are unhelpful. This area must be examined.

We also call for a review of fuel prices every three months instead of the current system of annual reviews. It does not make sense to review fuel prices once a year at budget time when the cost of oil on world markets changes all the time. The Minister should take up this point and try to introduce changes at ECOFIN meetings. The Minister is blaming Members on this side of the House for introducing it but I am sure he is capable of renegotiating.

In recent weeks I have received correspondence from some of the major hauliers in my county. I passed onto the Minister their concerns about the diesel price increase, from 83 cent per litre in March 2009 to €1.25 today, an increase of 50%, and the fact that laundered diesel is all over the country, which means legitimate hauliers cannot compete with carriers using illegal washed fuel. I welcome the fact the Minister will take action on laundered fuel and that he is working with the Government on the other side of the Border. It is a slow process and one that is causing a major loss of revenue to the State. It needs to be dealt with quickly.

Criminals, facilitated by the Government, are destroying the industry and the Government is standing idly by. The Government promotes and supports exports and has talked about a major increase in exports over the past number of years. At the same time, hauliers, who bring 95% of exports to the UK and Europe, are being crucified by fuel an motor taxes. Haulage prices are falling and companies and customers are renegotiating charges. Hauliers must also take into account the huge cost of fuel increases and many hauliers are going out of business. I noted that from the last document the haulage association sent to me, the number of haulage licences dropped by 1,300 in the past three years, representing a loss of approximately 10,000 jobs. This is a serious situation.

In fairness to the Irish Road Haulage Association, it has put forward solutions. The Minister has a working group in place and it is important that this group concludes its discussions and dialogue and comes up with solutions. If it does not, many more hauliers will go out of business. They are getting very impatient with the Minister at the slowness of the working group in producing its final report. I welcome the fact that the Minister said tonight that following a couple of more meetings he will bring forward solutions to the problems encountered by hauliers throughout the country. The Minister is aware of an EU directive that allows governments to support the haulage industry in their country and many countries in Europe do this and give an essential user rebate to hauliers in accordance with this directive. It is important the Government works on that.

As Deputy Kehoe knows, I worked in the oil business for approximately 15 years and I have a fair knowledge of how companies operate. It is well known that cartels and price fixing operate in the oil business. This begs the question whether, even allowing for the high cost of fuel on the world market, oil companies here are overcharging customers in Ireland. I believe they are. The Minister should ask the Competition Authority to investigate the operations of the oil industry in Ireland. For far too long, from national to local level, the industry has operated cartels within the industry. This is not in the best interest of the consumer. There is little competition and it is time the Competition Authority investigated the operations of the oil industry here.

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