asked the Minister for Industry, Commerce and Energy if he is satisfied that petrol companies are being even-handed in the distribution of petrol as between company-owned and dealer-owned stations.

I have already stated in the House that all reasonable steps are being taken to ensure that oil supplies are distributed as equitably as possible. While I do not have details for each petrol station in the country, investigations carried out by my Department on a number of occasions have shown that allegations of unfair treatment of dealer-owned stations were not well-founded. On the basis of such investigations and other information currently available to me I have no grounds for believing that the oil companies discriminate between company-owned and dealer-owned stations.

Has the Minister any system of spot checks or has he access to the necessary information to ascertain whether fair play is being given to dealer-owned stations?

We get regular returns from the companies of their deliveries.

To each station.

Yes.

Will the Minister intervene if we can bring examples of uneven distribution to his notice?

This allegation is fairly frequently made and has been looked into on several occasions by my Department. No evidence has been found to sustain it. It may be that somebody could produce evidence that an individual filling station for some reason got more or less in a particular month, but taking one month with another there does not seem to be any evidence to support it. I have looked at the figures for several years past and there is no evidence of undue growth in the through-put of company-owned stations as against independently-owned stations. There is some growth on both sides. The number of company-owned stations has been decreasing in recent years and this is something I welcome.

If we can produce evidence will the Minister take action?

Yes, I will examine and investigate it.

5.