Out of all the April Fools jokes in today’s national press, my favourite one must be the penny hike in fuel tax that is set to push petrol prices to a record high this weekend.
Other good contenders were the Flying AA man who rushes off to save stranded motorists with a jet-pack on his back, as reported in the Daily Mail, while the super soaraway Sun claimed “the world’s first flavoured page” with a “Lick Here” instruction on a black square box in the newspaper.
A story that B&Q is to sell a new compost accelerator power by human urine was also good. Apparently, litre bottles of new Wee&Q will retail for just 10p, made up of urine collected from the DIY store’s plumbing system.
There were others – British Polar Bears and floating hotels for football fans, but none quite as good as the hike in fuel duty.
As the British economy lumbers out of recession, further taxing the beleaguered motorist is a riot. We’re paying 30p a litre more than a year ago. We have to find this extra money we spend on fuel from somewhere, so we reduce our expenditure on other goods and services, which has an adverse knock-on effect on those businesses.
It’s always great fun going through the papers and spotting the April Fools Jokes. But the fuel one takes the biscuit. As the late great Victor Meldrew would say, “I don’t believe it!”
And allegedly, there’s going to be further rises in October and January. Hahahahaha!
