Guido was surprised to see Sir Ed Davey during PMQs today claim that rural communities are “bearing the brunt of record fuel prices”, and calling for the expansion of the rural fuel duty relief scheme. Has anyone bothered to tell him his own party’s policies?

Not only have the LibDems repeatedly voted against the government’s fuel duty freezes – and this year’s fuel duty cut – the party’s own flagship climate policy, released back in September, actually calls for “reinstating the indexation of road fuel duty”. That would mean a return to regular yearly increases in the tax – and as indexed against RPI, would mean an 11% hike in the tax.

The policy also calls for “graduating VED (Vehicle Excise Duty) by fuel efficiency and increasing rates for fossil fuel vehicles overall“, which amounts to another tax hike on rural drivers. Still, when you’ve got a rural by-election looming, it’s best not to let your own policies get in the way…