Yahoo Finance ‘There is plenty of fuel’ Petrol retailers reassure drivers as demand to return to normal in days
Petrol retailers have told drivers there is “plenty of fuel”.
London has been hit with the brunt of petrol shortage as up to 90 per cent of outlets in the British capital have run out of petrol and diesel.
But the UK fuel industry – including BP, Shell and Esso – said the demand will return to normal in days after drivers begun panic buying petrol.
It revealed the retailers were working closely with the government to ensure fuel was available to people across the country.
In the statement issued by the department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, said: “There is plenty of fuel at UK refineries and terminals, and as an industry we are working closely with the government to help ensure fuel is available to be delivered to stations across the country.
“As many cars are now holding more fuel than usual, we expect that demand will return to its normal levels in the coming days, easing pressures on fuel station forecourts. We would encourage everyone to buy fuel as they usually would.
“We remain enormously grateful to all forecourt staff and HGV drivers for working tirelessly to maintain supplies during this time.”
Environment Secretary George Eustice dispelled rumours Boris Johnson was going to bring in the army to resolve the fuel crisis.
Instead, he revealed the Government has “no plans at the moment” to use the army to drive petrol tankers amid continuing shortages at filling stations.
Mr Eustice said: “We are bringing Ministry of Defence trainers in to accelerate some of the HGV training to clear a backlog of people who want to carry out those tests, and there’s definitely a role there for the MOD.
“In terms of other things we’ve no plans at the moment to bring in the Army to actually do the driving, but we always have a Civil Contingencies section within the Army on standby – but we’re not jumping to that necessarily at the moment.”
It comes after a Heathrow petrol station closed toliets to stop “desperate” drivers from waiting for fuel.
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