A future Conservative government can hold out no promise of a halt to the current administration's fuel duty escalator, shadow transport minister Stephen Hammond told a fringe meeting hosted by the Freight Transport Association (FTA) at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester this week.
Hammond said he would have to "cop out" on the issue of fuel duty as that was a matter for the Treasury, not the DfT.
FTA policy director James Hookham called on the government to stop "taking cash out of the industry" in rising fuel duty. He said: "Two pence per litre adds around £1,000 a year to the cost of running a truck. For that, an operator could train each driver three times in safer and more efficient driving."
Hammond did, however, hold out hope that a future Tory government would introduce a foreign lorry road user charge.