Consumer watchdog will crack down on petrol price gouging when tax cut ends, Labor says

The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, says he has put ‘refiners, importers, wholesalers and retailers’ on notice over price-gouging as the end of the petrol excise cut nears. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

The federal treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has asked the competition watchdog to crack down hard on any price gouging when the petrol excise cut expires at the end of September.

The letter to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, released on Monday, confirms the government’s intention to reintroduce “the full excise” on 29 September. It was halved for six months in the March budget.