Superstores Slash Diesel To Below £1 A Litre

It follows the cut in unleaded prices to below £1 a litre two weeks before Christmas.

Asda said there would be New Year cheer for drivers from Monday with a 3p per litre cut on diesel – making it the first retailer to bring diesel prices to below £1. “This reduction will mean millions of customers save money by shopping at Tesco”.

But the motorist organisation said the wholesale price of diesel should have been cut earlier as it had been below that of petrol since before Christmas.

‘If oil prices continue to fall then we remain ready to cut the price of diesel and unleaded’.

Avishai Moor, head of fuel, said: “This is great news for diesel drivers and kicks off 2016 on a really positive note”.

Experts said it was “not that far-fetched” to imagine fuel prices could fall further, to hit 90p per litre.

The RAC has welcomed the move, describing it as “overdue”.

Diesel drivers filling up at one of the big three supermarkets will now pay £20 less to fill up a 50 litre fuel tank compared with the high point reached in 2012.

Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco are all now offering cheaper fuel after a long period of depressed world oil prices. He said: “It will also benefit United Kingdom business which runs on diesel and should be a further stimulus to the economy”.

The majority of the price of United Kingdom fuel, around 75%, goes to the Treasury in duty and Value-Added Tax.

Along with the current global product prices for petrol and diesel, the INR-USD exchange rate too has been sited as a factor leading to the decrease in costs.

It pointed out that more miles were driven in the United Kingdom on diesel than on petrol.

The RAC pointed out that while more vehicles use petrol than diesel, as the majority of private cars use petrol, more miles are driven using petrol thanks to hauliers and public transport using diesel.