Discounts not passed on by bowser wowsers

Spokesman David Cumming said the RACV's recent monitoring of Melbourne prices had shown they were falling at a slower pace on Tuesdays and Wednesdays than in the past.

"There has been a very subtle change in the pricing of Melbourne," he said. "We no longer appear to go as low as Sydney and the Adelaide market."

Mr Cumming said the two chains, which he described as the market's price leaders, had changed their pricing patterns.

"They used to down on the cheapest days of the week to roughly the wholesale price or slightly below," he said. "They now appear to want to stay roughly three cents above the wholesale price."

But Woolworths spokesman Luke Schepen said prices reflected costs. "Prices across different outlets can vary for a number of reasons," he said. "The profit before tax on petrol is 1.8 cents per litre. Our petrol outlets are high-volume and low-margin businesses."

The national average price of unleaded fuel rose by 1.5 cents this week, according to Australian Institute of Petroleum figures.

According to the RACV, the highest price for unleaded petrol in Melbourne was 158.9 cents a litre yesterday, and the average price was 148.9 cents. The lowest price was 143.5 cents in St Albans.

Meanwhile, Federal Opposition consumer affairs spokesman Luke Hartsuyker said the Government had failed to reform the wholesale petrol market as recommended by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

"Instead, Kevin Rudd has gone for the quick fix of FuelWatch, which the ACCC did not recommend in that report, to get himself off the hook with all those voters who he led to believe in the election that he would cut the price of petrol," Mr Hartsuyker said.