RED DIESEL UPDATE

The Current State of Play

I suppose this is really my ‘sign off’ on the red diesel reporting. By now you will all be
aware of the need to either have an ongoing agreement or confirm on each fill up how
much of the fuel will be used for cooking and heating and how much for propulsion.

MDL, Corralls and others are seeking a standing agreement. I expect you will need to
confirm to the retailer directly when cruising out of home port.

At least we have some relief with the sensible treatment by HMRC of the application of
the tax. You will remember that this all came about because we lost a long standing
concession with the EU to have a dispensation for certain uses of diesel – boating being
among them.

For a long time it looked like the Government – despite intense lobbying by the RYA and
others - including petitions – was going to take the ‘lazy’ option and apply road tax duty
to the whole of the use of (red) diesel. Why they couldn’t have declared this as their
stance earlier just beats me!

I suppose the final thing to reflect on is that, despite paying pretty much road prices on
the propulsion part of the diesel are we getting a road quality product

For another day!

Jonathan Saunders
Chair – CQBHA – chairman@cqbha.org