I have just been on holiday in France and Spain driving in the last two weeks......... and if you thought that was funny that I appeared to be around all the time - that was VA Virtual Assistant Jo who managed my email, facebook accounts etc.....well what else could a VA do?

Now if your thinking what the bloody hell I'm on about, and what has it got to do with petrol, gas etc as the word takes you......... You got a point!

In the old days - a few years ago before Gordon Bennett! Brown devalued the £ sterling, petrol in France used to be cheaper than in the UK..... however it's now on par and even a little more expensive.

On the 25th June I drove from my home to Paris through Eurotunnel, and then onto Lourdes.....some 700 miles plus in a day......and found out that6 the price on the motorway for unleaded 95 was close on 1.61 Euros (£1.28), and the price in a supermarket like Carrefour was 1.51 Euros (£1.20) or thereabouts, making the price in petrol the same as in the UK or a little over. The price in Spain (we later drove to Barcelona) 1.28 Euros (£1.02) was less expensive on the motorway.

Buying petrol yesterday in Watford, UK I paid £117.9 a litre (148.18 Euros), and that does make it slightly cheaper than par in France, but had I bought at a BP station I am sure it would have been over par, wouldn't it!

Now I was told that the SMIC (Minimum wage in France) was around 1 254.28 Euros (£997.97), whilst in Spain it's about 750 Euros a month, coupled with the UK it's £5.52 an hour (6.94 Euros).

The French only work 35 hours a week, while in Britain we work 37.5 hours a week........