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04. 02. 10. - 16:00

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04. 02. 10. - 16:00

Petroleum tax revenues at €3.8bn in 2009

The Finance Ministry received 3.8 billion Euros in revenue from the petroleum tax last year, according to car club Arbö.

Arbö manager Leo Musil added today (Thurs) that the ministry had received a total of 34.12 billion Euros in revenue from the tax during the last 10 years and so there was no reason for "capricious imposition of new taxes."

He was referring to talk of an increase in the tax in the framework of a new national energy strategy.

The petroleum tax is a tax on each litre of car fuel. The tax amounts to 44.7 cents on each litre of Eurosuper and 34.2 cents on each litre of diesel.

The Economy Chamber’s (WKO) energy providers division expressed its opposition to an increase in the tax today.

It said so-called "tank tourism" in which foreign drivers enter Austria to purchase cheaper fuel not only helped the Austrian economy but contributed an extra one billion Euros to state coffers.

But a top economic think tank has backed higher taxes on energy.

Institute for Economic Research (Wifo) official Margit Schratzenstaller said earlier this week that Wifo supported higher taxes if efforts to consolidate the budget through capping expenditures failed.

Karl Bruckner from the business trustees’ chamber added that higher energy taxes would constitute an incentive for investment in energy saving. He said 5.9 per cent of Austrian tax revenue had come from energy taxes in 2006, compared to an EU average of 6.4 per cent.

People’s Party (ÖVP) spokesman Günter Stummvoll, however, said he remained opposed to tax increases as part of budgetary consolidation.

Stummvoll also claimed that ÖVP Economy Minister Reinhold Mitterlehner’s calls for a higher tax on petroleum products was based on "ecological grounds" rather than on the need to deal with "deficit financing."

Mitterlehner called last month for taxes to have an ecological focus.

Austrian Times

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