More UK fuel price records reached as Middle East conflict continues

The continuation of the Middle East conflict between Iran, and the US and Israel has seen more records broken for UK fuel prices.

Since the conflict began on 28 February, fuel prices have already been found in March to have risen in the UK by their greatest amount for a single month – in the cases of both petrol and diesel.

It’s diesel that has broken the record for the number of consecutive days of price rise, though, as shown by RAC data which says that both fossil fuel types rose each day for 40 consecutive days. This is an outright record for diesel and matches the record for Petrol that was set in June 2022.

“The average prices of both petrol and diesel have now increased every day for the last 40 days,” said, Simon Williams, the RAC’s head of policy, in a statement released by the RAC on 10 April.

“For diesel this is a new record for consecutive daily prices rises since 2015 and for petrol it matches the run of rises seen at the end of June 2022. 

“A full tank of diesel for a 55-litre family car is now £105.22, up £27 since the end of February. 

“The cost for a similar petrol car is now £87, £14 more than it was before the conflict began.”

Williams added that there was positivity to be found in that per-barrel oil prices had fallen below the $100 mark towards the end of last week. 

However, US president Donald Trump then announced last night (12 April) that his country’s navy would form a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz to prevent ships that had paid a toll to Iran for passage through the strait from reaching their intended destination. It’s a retaliation to Iran’s effective closure of the strait that effectively reinforces it, at least in theory, and does not increase the possibility of global oil supplies picking up in the coming days or weeks. As a result, Monday morning saw oil prices rise back above $100 per barrel.

The announcement of the plans to blockade the strait by the US came after talks between the US and Iran failed to produce an agreement to end the war over the weekend, with each side concluding that the current demands of the other are incompatible with their own interests at present.

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