UK van drivers face £2.5bn diesel cost surge as fuel duty rise looms

Across Britain, the owners of diesel vans and pickups are bracing for a brutal year at the pump. The combined bill for millions of van drivers is expected to climb by £2.5 billion this year alone, according to analysis prepared for the Guardian. In total, these commercial operators will spend nearly £8.5 billion on diesel in 2026—a staggering jump from the £5.95 billion they spent in 2025. The culprit is a global fuel shortage triggered by refinery disruptions in the Middle East and Russia, sending diesel prices to record highs and forcing a reckoning across the entire supply chain.

For an individual van driver, the math is unforgiving. The average fuel bill is projected to reach £1,965 this year, up from £1,294 in 2025—a 52 percent increase calculated by analysts at Moneysupermarket based on typical mileage and consumption. This matters not just to the people behind the wheel. The number of vans on British roads has surged in recent years, driven by the explosion in online shopping, home deliveries, and the growing ranks of self-employed tradespeople. About 95 percent of light commercial vehicles still run on diesel, meaning there is no quick escape into electric alternatives for most operators. When diesel prices climb this steeply, the cost gets passed down the chain: retailers absorb higher logistics expenses and fold them into the price of food and goods on supermarket shelves.

The pressure on fuel costs has been relentless. Diesel pump prices broke through £2 per litre for the first time this month—a climb of more than 40 percent since late February, when the US-Israel conflict with Iran began disrupting crude oil and refined products flowing from the Gulf. The RAC, the motoring group, has documented the damage: diesel now costs about 57 pence per litre more than it did before the conflict, while petrol is 42 pence higher. For a household filling up a family car, that translates to an extra £31 per tank for diesel and £23 for petrol.

Into this crisis, the government is preparing to make things worse. Fuel duty is scheduled to rise by 3 pence per litre from January 1st and another 2 pence from March 1st—a hike that was postponed from September but remains on the calendar. The Road Haulage Association, which represents commercial operators, is calling the planned increase a hammer blow. Richard Smith, the RHA's managing director, pointed out that many members operate on margins of around 2 percent. "Surging diesel prices are impacting firms across the country, with some spending many thousands extra every week on fuel," he said. "Adding fuel duty rises on top of today's fuel prices would be a hammer blow for many firms that move goods and the households that buy them. A fuel duty hike is a food price hike."

The RHA and other industry voices are pushing the government to abandon the duty increase entirely. Simon Williams, head of policy at the RAC, echoed the call: "The fuel duty rise will only make prices at the pump even more expensive. As things stand, this year is still set to be the second most expensive year on record for drivers. The government has the power to take some of the sting out of higher fuel costs, either by extending and increasing the fuel duty cut or reducing VAT as they've done with domestic electricity."

The RHA has gone further, calling on the chancellor to introduce a 15 pence per litre rebate for British van, coach, and haulage operators—matching support that Spain, France, and Italy have already offered their commercial vehicle operators. Smith said simply: "It's time we caught up." The government has not yet responded to requests for comment on whether it will reconsider the planned duty rise or introduce any form of relief for the sector. Meanwhile, diesel prices remain volatile, with recent dips offering little comfort against the structural damage already done to operator margins and household budgets downstream.