Government pleased with reduced fuel tax rate

The government on Friday welcomed the unanimous approval by the House of Representatives of the bill reducing fuel tax rate, aiming to relieve Cypriot consumers in a period of inflation.

Government Spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis said the measure, implemented at a cost of €25.6 million, has already been reflected in the retail petrol prices.

“With the checks carried out today by the Consumer Protection Service, it became clear that gas stations have reduced their prices to an absolute extent after the reduction of the consumption tax,” he said during a regular media briefing at the Presidential Palace.

The service will monitor the market systematically both for the issue of the reduction of the consumption tax for fuel and regarding the proper implementation of the reduced VAT, Letymbiotis added.

He explained that the measure is part of the package of 17 measures with a total cost of €196 million approved by the cabinet to support Cypriot households. The package also contains measures for immediate relief for households, but also permanent, substantial solutions to deal with the energy shortage that has plagued Cypriot households in recent years.

“Our vision as a government…is to provide permanent and long-term solutions, not based on temporary benefit policies, but…which fundamentally cover their basic needs,” the government spokesman stressed.

President Christodoulides has already signed the law and it has been published in the official newspaper which means it comes into force on Friday.

The price of 95 unleaded petrol dropped by 9 cents a litre to €1.46 cents today from €1.55 cents the day before, according to the Director of the Consumer Protection Service of the Ministry of Trade, Energy and Industry, Constantinos Karagiorgis.

Diesel oil decreased by an average of 8 cents per litre and it is now sold at €1.62 from €1.70 yesterday, Karagiorgis told the Cyprus News Agency.

On Friday, the lowest price at the stations for 95 octane unleaded petrol is €1.39 per litre and the highest is €1.54, while in diesel the lowest price is currently at €1.57 per litre and the highest is €1.71. That is, the variation in the price of petrol is 15 cents and of diesel 14 cents between the different gas stations in Cyprus.

Karagiorgis said “there is another positive and encouraging element for consumers, it is the indications that the Ministry Service has that Platts prices, i.e., the prices sold by the refineries, are falling”.

This, he noted, “may be reflected in the next period with some further small decline in fuel prices”.

Karagiorgis explained that the prices are lower today compared to March 2022, when the consumption tax was first reduced after the prices had skyrocketed due to the war in Ukraine. There is currently a downward trend in Platts prices based on the indications that are there, he added.

The House plenum unanimously passed a law to reduce the rates of excise duty on fuel on Thursday. The move is a reversal of the government’s decision to scrap the last temporary reduced fuel tax rates at the beginning of July.

The reduced fuel tax rate will remain in place until March 3, while the reduced tax on heating oil will apply from November 15 until March 31. As a result, heating oil will now be 6.39 cents per litre cheaper.