Fuel excise a fixed rate

I REFER to the letter from Donal Fellows headlined ‘Oil-fuelled inflation not beyond our control’ (July 19).

Mr Fellows was wrong in converting the excise rate per litre of fuel to read as a percentage of the price — eg, the excise duty on 1,000 litres of unleaded petrol is €442.68 or 44.3 cent per litre. Likewise, diesel is €368.05 per 1,000 litres or 36.8 cent per litre.

The excise rate is a fixed charge per litre and does not increase with the price of fuel, while VAT does. The selling price of motor fuel contains VAT at 21%.