HIGHER PETROL TAX

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 33, 9 February 1933, Page 12

HIGHER PETROL TAX

MOTORISTS CONCERNED

SPIRIT WILL COST MORE

Motorists^- both those who use cars for pleasure and those who use them for business purposes, are. not facing with equanimity the prospect of having to pay another threepence per gallon for motor spirit. It is generally anticipated that they will be the ones who have to pay thia extra impost, the optimist who thinks that the big oil companies will carry the burden being very hard to find. Neither is it considered likely or even possible for the retailer to pay the extra threepence and not pass it on. to'the ultimate consumer. As one retailer of spirit remarked this morning: "Not on your life! Our margin of profit is small enough.now; those who want the juice will have to pay for it, whatever the price." / No; statement .is available yet regarding the attitude- which will be taken up by the oil companies. Cablegrams were being exchanged this morning between the offices 'here and headquarters elsewhere, but nothing has been announced for publication. One prominent official in automobile' circles hazarded the opinion this morning that a cumulative result of the Government's' legislation would be a curtailment of the number of motor vehicles in use. "The exchange rate," he said, "must inevitably raise the cost of the-imported car now or in the near future; the sales tax will add still to the cost; and now comes an increase in the price of' motor spirit. The result will be that a prospective purchaser will think twice and think hard before launching out on buying a new car, or even a second-hand one. Theflf too, the operating costs of motors run for _ commercial purposes are going to be increased owing to the increase in the price of spirit. The margin of profit in many cases is already very small, if there exists any profit at all, and the running of a number of vehicles may, be given up altogether. It looks as if the good old horse may really be coming back into its own after all, especially as chaff is, I believe, exempt from the sales tax.'.' (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. Retailers in the city have not yet applied the increase in petrol tax. One large service station owner States that he can maintain the. present prices for another month. <