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THE last time I filled up, a litre of unleaded was a wallet-shredding £1.09.9. By the time you read this it will almost certainly be more. This time last year, it was 85p.

Oil is now running at well over $100 a barrel, pushing up the cost of fuel. The other thing that pushes up the cost of petrol and diesel is, of course, the Chancellor. I'm not going to - tempting as it is - rail about the iniquity of having to pay VAT on top of fuel duty (about 70 per cent) so you pay a tax for paying a tax. Instead I'm going to tell you how to legally avoid tax by getting more from your fuel.

My business partner, James, and I are doing more miles visiting clients and suppliers. So we decided to get some training. Because of running the Oxford Group, I try to get some sort of official training in twice a year anyway (it stops your skills going off and means you learn something new).

James is new to it. We booked a session with a mate, Ian, who runs a driver training business (RoadCraft Driver Training) and headed for Millbrook proving ground in Bedfordshire where we could practise on private roads.

We spent the day working on observation, anticipation, hazard management and a whole raft of car control skills. We also had an absolute blast. I know we're all supposed to wear hair-shirts and be polar bear-saving miserabilists nowadays, but I'm having none of it - training should be enjoyable.

One of the things Ian talked about was planning. Most drivers are reactive. They see hazards too late and simply react to whatever is going on at that moment.

It's the premise that most of the UK's road safety is based on - drivers are thick, don't plan ahead and don't look properly, therefore slow them down so they're not going so fast when they crash. Instead, we looked at actively planning the drive. That means looking ahead, seeing what IS happening, what's ABOUT to happen and what MIGHT happen, then planning how to deal with everything in advance. It gives you much, much more time to react (the key in avoiding crashes) and smoothes out the drive massively. But it doesn't just make your driving a lot safer, it also means you pay less tax. Of course, the Chancellor hasn't done anything sensible like encouraging driver and rider training with tax breaks, but get some training and you really will contribute less to the Exchequer. Here's how . . .

One of the things we talked about was how planning your drive cuts fuel consumption. It's pretty simple how it works. Instead of a series of reactive stabs at throttle and brake, speed going up and down like an FTSE plot, your rate of progress is much smoother.

By looking ahead, you're reducing your speed a little, well in advance, rather than jumping on the brakes at the last second. Likewise, you're not pouring fuel into the engine, accelerating madly, right up the back of a queue of traffic where you're only going to have to stop.

I hadn't realised the impact this would have on James' driving style until this weekend. From 27mpg (yes, I know - save the green ink) he's now getting 35mpg out of a pretty serious performance car with an increase in his average speed.

That's a 30 per cent increase in the miles he gets from each gallon of fuel. No changes to the car - just to the driver. Let's assume he's driving 12,000 miles (it's more, but 12k makes for easy maths); he's now saving £503 a year. At 70 per cent tax, that's £352 in fuel duty and VAT he won't have to pay. That means he can afford to give back the £20 he owes me from last week and probably buy me lunch as well. That's got to be good news.

Fancy paying less tax? The Oxford Group meets on the first Wednesday of each month at Exeter Hall, Kidlington, starting at 8pm. Practical taster drives throughout the summer months.

6:28am Friday 9th May 2008

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