With petrol prices and inflation both low, motorists can absorb a reversing of Sunak’s 5p cut – and it could even boost electric car sales

A chancellor desperate for ready cash, as Rachel Reeves finds herself, has one immediate source of new funds: increasing the tax on petrol again.

More than 14 years have passed since fuel duty was last increased, in 2010. That’s a legacy of concessions by the Conservatives to the car lobby. Now it’s time to tell drivers that the days of annual freezes are over, and that the UK’s car mileage tax needs to be higher to reduce emissions and limit climate change.