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DAILY EXPRESS (UK): DARLING MUST KEEP HIS HANDS OFF SHELL’S PROFITS

Friday February 1,2008

MANY people’s first instinct when reading about Shell’s extraordinary profits may be to agree with those Left-wingers who are calling for a windfall tax on oil companies.

But the very last thing hard-pressed motorists need is for more tax to be levied on petrol producers.

The Government is already getting a massive financial windfall from higher world oil prices. More than £3billion a year extra is flowing into Treasury coffers thanks to higher tax receipts from North Sea oil and gas production and higher VAT revenue from the pumps. That’s enough to fund a cut in fuel duty of at least 7p a litre.

At a time when reckless overspending has left the public finances in a parlous state, ministers will be delighted to see their friends in the trade union movement whipping up demands for extra taxation.

But the impact of a windfall tax would be precisely the same as that of higher fuel duties – even more expensive petrol. And who wants that?

Shell’s massive profit is a boon to the many British pension funds which hold shares in the company and will therefore benefit millions of families. Only a fraction of the financial surplus is generated from filling station sales, with much of it being earned overseas.

If Chancellor Alistair Darling does announce a windfall tax when he delivers his Budget on March 12, nobody should mistake him for Robin Hood.

He will not be taking from the rich to give to the poor but executing yet another punitive socialist raid on the pockets of hardworking Middle Britain.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/33461/Darling-must-keep-his-hands-off-Shell-s-profits

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