Draft Motor Fuel Price (Open Data) Regulations 2025

Edward Argar Excerpts

Tuesday 4th November 2025 General Committees

[Edward Argar (Melton and Syston) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. As my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Buckinghamshire, the shadow Minister, has set out, we welcome the intent behind the statutory instrument, which has the potential to considerably benefit the consumer. I echo a number of the points made by my hon. Friend. He highlighted the mission creep in what will potentially have to be reported, and a degree of vagueness in the SI and its supporting documents.

Paragraph 238 of the impact assessment states that there are 8,329 PFSs, of which 698—just over 8%—are deemed to be those of minor brands. One can surmise that means they are smaller operations and therefore potentially disproportionately impacted by a one-size-fits-all approach. I have about half a dozen factual questions, if I may. First, what was the rationale for using worldwide turnover as the basis for the fines? Has the Minister made any assessment of whether there are—and there may not be—any operators that have huge overseas operations but only a very small footprint in this country?

My hon. Friend the shadow Minister talked about the potential impact on small rural operators. Paragraph 7.4 of the explanatory memorandum refers to the potential impact of legacy technology, and to how the reporting mechanism will work. It simply says that the impact will be

“mitigated with taking a holistic view…of the scheme.”

What does that mean, in practical terms?

Paragraph 246 of the impact assessment says that the scheme will be launched at the end of this year, from which we are less than two months away. Is it on target to be launched then? If so, where has the procurement process for the aggregator got to? If an aggregator has been appointed, is the Minister able to tell the Committee which company or organisation has received that appointment? Similarly, paragraph 247 of the impact assessment talks about training that will be done in advance of the launch of the scheme. When will that be done and how, given the very tight timescales?

Finally, paragraph 248 of the impact assessment talks about enforcement guidance to come. Where has that guidance got to in the process, and when will it be published?