The Department of Energy and Climate Change said the average price of unleaded petrol in the UK reached 137.3p per litre this week. The previous record of 137.05p was set on May 9, 2011.

The average diesel price is also at a record high. Government figures reveal it to be 144.7p a litre, up 0.8p from the previous record, which was set last week.

The FairFuel lobby took its campaign for fuel price cuts to Westminster last week as it published a new report compiled by the Centre for Economics and Business Research suggesting that fuel duty cuts would boost economic growth and create thousands of new jobs.

The FairFuel Campaign said: “These are not insignificant impacts in the current climate of less than 1% annual growth. But this is not to mention the intangible benefits that could flow from the morale boost provided to consumers by helping to alleviate the current squeeze on their disposable incomes.”