Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has indicated that the final excise duty reversal will not be put back on petrol and diesel as he warned that there will be fewer one-off payments in this year's Budget.

The Fine Gael parliamentary party is meeting for its annual think-in in Limerick on Friday and Saturday to discuss its priorities for the new Dáil term. During the opening Friday press conference, much of the attention was on October 10’s budget and Fine Gael’s priorities for the big day.

With petrol prices rising again following the reversal of excise duty cuts on September 1, attention is now turning to the final excise duty cut reversal on October 31 that would see 8c added to the price of a litre of petrol and 6c added to diesel. The Government cut excise duty on petrol and diesel in March 2022 when prices at the pumps reached nearly €2.20 per litre and has been removing the cuts on a phased basis.

Mr Varadkar has now indicated that the Government wants to prevent prices skyrocketing over €2 again. "One of the prices that I am very aware of and I know all of my colleagues are very aware of is the price of petrol and diesel," he said.

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"It’s the price that’s in your face every day as you drive down the road and it is tacking back up again, in part because some of the temporary tax cuts have been reversed but also because the price of oil is going up again. If you remember, we cut excise around the time it hit €2. I wouldn’t like to see us put excise up to hit €2 again and then to have to bring it down again.

"I think what we’ll do between now and Budget Day is really monitor prices at the pump and that will allow us on Budget Day to make that decision." Finance Minister Michael McGrath also indicated at the Fianna Fáil think-in earlier this week that the final reversal is under review.

In Limerick, the Taoiseach said that his Government would focus on "helping families with the cost of living" and "making sure work pays and the people get to keep more of their own hard-earned money". Mr Varadkar also indicated that there will be one-off payments as part of the budget but that they will "not be on the scale of last year".

"Bear in mind since last year, inflation has started to moderate, wages have increased," he said. "So I don't think one-offs will be on the scale of what people would have seen last year."

Following the announcement from the ECB on Thursday that mortgage rates would increase by another 0.25 per cent, Mr Varadkar also confirmed that the Government is looking at targeted mortgage interest relief. The Taoiseach said that there has been a "lot of financial distress because mortgage interest rates have gone up so much so quickly".

He added: "But anything that would be broad-based would be prohibitively expensive. I think if we are going to do something to help people on mortgage interest, it really should focus on those who are paying the highest rates and those who might be at risk of losing their homes."

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