John O'Mahony (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for selecting the topic and I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Simon Harris, for cancelling other business to reply to this debate. I also congratulate him on his appointment.

This concerns fuel contamination, which has been happening throughout the west, the midlands and in the Mayo constituency. It involves mixing kerosene into petrol. Kerosene costs 80 cent per litre and petrol is €1.55 per litre and doing this increases the amount of petrol but it destroys the engines of cars more quickly than laundered diesel was doing some years ago.

It has reached epidemic proportions in my constituency over the past number of weeks, as unsuspecting motorists buy fuel at certain outlets. Some people have had more than one engine destroyed and some insurance companies are excluding it from cover or not covering it in new policies that are issued. Almost 400 people attended a public meeting in Swinford, County Mayo on Tuesday. What measures are in place to deal with this? There must be immediate action to identify and eliminate the source of the practice. There must be some help for unsuspecting motorists, some of whom have also had a replacement engine destroyed by this.

A few years ago, there was diesel laundering and legislation was introduced making the amount of green diesel purchased by retailers traceable. When I checked, I found that it is not true for petrol. It would help to eliminate the source of this fuel.

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