MP Suppachot of the Prachachon Party criticized the government for failing to solve the problem of high oil prices. He said they used every tactic to temporarily stabilize prices but avoided confronting energy capital groups. He urged reforms of the price structure, collection of windfall taxes, and a serious crackdown on illegal oil trade.
On 23 October 2026, MP Suppachot Chaisat, a party-list MP of the Prachachon Party, commented on the continuously rising domestic oil prices, saying the current situation reflects the government's failure in management, leaving almost no tools to handle the energy crisis. The fuel fund's deficit has surpassed 100 billion baht, while the government refuses to reduce excise tax on oil to ease public burden due to severe fiscal constraints.
Suppachot added that the government tries to address the problem with short-term measures, drawing funds from every source—for example, proposing to use money from the Energy Conservation Fund to boost liquidity, even though that budget should be invested in long-term energy reduction. They also considered using dividend income from the Ministry of Finance's oil company shares to support prices. However, the structural reform measures the government once announced have yet to show concrete results on three key issues.
The first issue is reforming the oil price structure that references the Singapore market price. Although the Energy Minister previously mentioned reviewing this structure, since Thailand has its own oil refineries, referencing Singapore's refined oil prices involves hidden costs that do not reflect real costs and are unfair to the public. Yet, there is still no clear conclusion on how to permanently reform the oil price structure.
The second issue concerns imposing a windfall tax during a time when the public suffers from high oil prices. Some energy operators have earned enormous profits amid the crisis, with some refineries posting record profits in the tens of billions of baht. This shows that current controls on refinery profits are insufficient. Many European countries have implemented windfall taxes to collect excess profits to relieve public burden, but Thailand still lacks concrete implementation of such tax collection.
The third issue is illegal oil smuggling, hoarding, tax evasion, and other violations in the oil business. Although the government has declared serious action, the public wants to see not just committee formations but tangible results—such as arrests of major offenders, prosecutions, asset seizures, and closing legal loopholes—to ensure fairness and protect the country's fiscal interests.
"The problem for our fellow citizens is not just the high oil prices," Suppachot said in conclusion, "but the government's inefficiency, which cannot even solve the structural problems it once promised to fix. They vow to fight to the end but tremble when facing powerful interests."