Police warn petrol theft could rise; urge surveillance and prepaid pumps

A rusty green fuel trailer hardly looked worth stealing, but sometime before 1 March it was hooked to a vehicle and taken from a property at Huntley, south of Orange in the New South Wales central tablelands. The tank contained 800 litres of diesel, and since the US-Israeli bombing of Iran on 28 February the price of diesel has climbed towards $3 a litre in some places, with unleaded not far behind.

Police warned rising fuel prices and fears of shortages are expected to increase thefts from service stations and farms. In South Australia the police commissioner Grant Stevens suggested officers might stop investigating "drive-offs" at service stations unless retailers installed prepaid pumps, saying: "This takes police away from other responsibilities that we could be attending to." Industry groups countered that prepaid pumps could cost $5,000 each and the expense would be passed to consumers.

Australia, New South Wales

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