“There’s 30, 40 million litres sitting at some of the terminals, but the gates are closed.”
Energy Minister Chris Bowen and Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth have both denied there is a shortage and said there was enough stock of petrol, diesel and jet fuel.
“We have more fuel in this country than in the last 15 years,” Rishworth earlier said on Today.
Bowen said the issue was a “spike in extra orders”.
“And inevitably, when you’re seeing a huge increase in demand, they’re [industry] having trouble keeping up with that,” he said.
Clifton echoed former Nationals leader David Littleproud’s call for the government to “unlock” the fuel being held back and solve the crisis that is smashing regional Australia.
“If they just left it alone, everything would be flowing as normal.”
Clifton yesterday warned that Transwest Fuels retailers, based in Tamworth, had some diesel left but that it wouldn’t last long.
He said there is now “absolutely nothing” left at his bowsers.
“No diesel, no petrols at all,” he said.
“We have our own trucks and we run to the port, so we’ve stood all drivers down for tomorrow.
“If we can’t get any access to anything on Thursday or Friday, then we’re looking to shut our whole service station network down.”
Australia only has two oil refineries in Brisbane and in Newcastle, which supply around 20 per cent of the country’s liquid fuel demand.
Building regional refineries – an expensive infrastructure – has been suggested as a way to protect local communities and ease the supply pressure.
“We need more of them. There should be one in each capital city or outside each capital city,” Clifton said.
It would then give us a buffer. The government will say they’re too expensive.
“But it doesn’t matter how expensive it is because if the money stays in Australia, it gets spent here.”
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