Petrol and diesel prices Northern Ireland: Average diesel prices drop while petrol rises

As usual, the average UK Average Fuel Prices today were significantly higher. According to PetrolPrices.com, they were Unleaded at 146.9p and diesel at 159.9p.

The Consumer Council online fuel comparison tool allows drivers to compare the best deals across NI. It has been widely credited by experts as helping keep forecourt prices in NI much lower than in England.

The NI prices are issued every Thursday by the Consumer Council for Northern Ireland.

Forecourt prices have soared since Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February last year, when average NI prices were 145.6p for petrol and 148.2p for diesel.

They then soared to NI peaks in June 2022 of 197.5p for diesel and 189.9p for petrol.

Since then the NI prices have generally declined steadily, although there have been significantly more fluctuation in petrol prices.

The lowest and highest average diesel prices for NI this week were Downpatrick at 156.9p and Omagh with 145.7p. The equivalent petrol prices were Newry with 149.9p and Coleraine at 140.5p.

AA spokesman Luke Bosdet said: “Since late March, the wholesale cost of diesel has been cheaper than petrol yet drivers are paying more at the pump. The 6.6p-a-litre price gap at the pump in Northern Ireland is shrinking and more than half that in the southern half of the UK. Fuel price transparency will have contributed to that better pricing but it still irritates drivers that diesel doesn’t move closer to parity with petrol more quickly.”

In December the UK competition watchdog said it was to deepen a probe into fuel retailers. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said it had seen “some evidence of rocket and feather behaviour” – when prices shoot up rapidly but come down slowly – last year, which had not been evident in previous years.

The latest figures come after the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) inflation hit 10.1% in March, a fall from 10.4% in February, but still much higher than the 9.8% that experts had predicted.

Increases were partly offset by lower fuel costs, with petrol and diesel costs down 5.9% against the same month last year after prices had spiked following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Lower petrol prices and an easing to global supply chain disruption are expected to support a continued decline in overall inflation.

The Consumer Council online petrol and diesel price comparison tool allows drivers to compare the best deals across NI. It has been widely credited by experts as helping keep forecourt prices in NI much lower than in England.