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Gas price rumours cause panic across Canada
Last Updated Thu, 22 Sep 2005 15:38:42 EDT
CBC News
Rumours of gas price increases are causing lineups at pumps across Canada before Hurricane Rita even lands in the Gulf of Mexico.
Price for regular gas is at 167.4 cents a litre in Quebec City, Sept. 22, 2005. (CP PHOTO/Jacques Boissinot)
"There are a lot of folks out there who are running to get to a gas station and I would suggest that they shouldn't panic," said Steve Ecclestone, general manager of Ultramar, adding that his Montreal-based company was closely monitoring the market and wasn't planning immediate increases. "It's crazy. It's just a lot of fear, panic and rumours going on."
In Halifax, a website monitoring gas prices reported prices were holding at $1.11 per litre. But gossip of stations in other areas charging $2 per litre had panicky people running pumps dry.
"The rumours were insane -- everything from $2.25 a litre in Ontario to $1.90 in Halifax," said Jennifer Murphy, a supervisor at an Irving gas station outside Halifax.
The cost to fill up varies wildly across the country. Prices have reached $2.20 in Toronto Ont., $1.92 in Laval, Que., $1.79 in Glace Bay, N.S. and $1.29 in the Gulf Islands, B.C.
Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty says reports of gasoline selling for over two dollars a litre in parts of Ontario create a false impression that there is a fuel shortage. McGuinty told reporters that he wants the federal Competition Bureau to find out why gas prices vary by as much as a dollar a litre.
Even Graham Conrad, executive director of the Retail Gasoline Dealers Association of Nova Scotia, rushed to fill up after hearing a report that prices in Ontario were topping $2 and were expected to go up to $1.80 in Halifax. "I had it in the back of my mind, as probably every other motorist in metro had, that we'd better fill up while we have the chance," Conrad said.
Nova Scotia Premier John Hamm said the province is powerless to influence the price of gas, but added he was monitoring the situation. "We can do what we can do to make sure people aren't being gouged; that the price is fair and is being determined by demand and not gouging," he said.
Bill Simpkins, Ottawa-based spokesman for the Canadian Petroleum Products Institute, said the panic buying would only cause more problems in terms of distribution and pricing. "Certainly, fear does drive up prices and we're concerned about that."
Most of the concern has to do with the 18 oil refineries in and near the Gulf of Mexico, which account for nearly one quarter of the refining capacity in the United States.
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