The fuel protests hit Portugal's roads again

Anger over fuel prices and the government’s lack of support spilled onto the roads. It's Saturday, 26 September. Thirty degrees. Air quality: 60 (Moderate). Here's what you need to know.

🗞️ FUEL PROTESTS BRING PORTUGAL'S ROADS TO A CRAWL

The frustration over record fuel prices that has simmered all month finally boiled over onto the roads on Friday. Hundreds of trucks staged a 150-kilometre go-slow convoy up the A1, from Paredes in the north to Coimbra, while in Lisbon commuters leaned on their horns crossing the 25 de Abril bridge at 8am. One lorry led the convoy with a sign that summed up the mood: "Today, the trucks are stopping, but their importance isn't."

The numbers behind the anger are stark. Fuel has hit all-time highs in Portugal, with pump prices up 24% year on year in August and diesel now above €2 a litre, driven by supply disruption tied to the Iran war and refinery attacks linked to the war in Ukraine. The truckers, mostly from earthmoving and quarrying firms, say they have been shut out of the partial tax refunds that freight and passenger transport companies already receive. The bridge commuters want more still: a suspension of the 23% VAT on fuel, toll relief, and the return of pandemic-era remote working. They also want the environment minister gone, over her much-criticised suggestion that people simply drive more slowly to use less fuel.

By coincidence of timing rather than any response to the protest, the same day saw President Seguro sign off a package of fuel support the Prime Minister had already announced. It extends help for agriculture, forestry, fisheries and aquaculture to the end of the year, including keeping the 10-cent-a-litre agricultural diesel subsidy alive at a cost of around €15 million, and it widens the €20 Green Rail Pass to cover urban rail. But here is the rub: none of it covers the earthmoving and haulage firms who were out on the A1. They are protesting precisely because they have been left out of exactly this kind of support.

Separately, the government moved to squash the other fear circulating this week, that Portugal might face France-style shortages, stressing it has 92 days of strategic fuel reserves, above the 90-day international floor, and suppliers spread well away from the conflict zones.

For the protesters, none of it touches the thing they actually want: a cut to the tax that makes up so much of the pump price. The truckers got a promise of a meeting at the infrastructure ministry on Monday, where Minister Miguel Pinto Luz conceded the sector had been "overlooked in some ways." That is an opening, not a concession, and with the 2027 budget due in parliament within weeks, the fight over fuel tax is only going to sharpen.

Bottom line: the protests were real, disruptive and popular, but the support the state signed this week goes to other sectors entirely, and the firms on the motorway are angry precisely because they have been excluded from it. Monday's meeting is the next test of whether that changes.

⚡ QUICK HITS

Portugal's housing market is now driven by locals, as foreign buyers retreat. New INE, Statistics Portugal, figures show that of the 40,142 homes sold between April and June, 95.3% went to people living in Portugal, while purchases by non-residents fell 10.3% year on year. The pullback follows the end of golden-visa property investment, the closure of the old non-habitual resident tax regime, and a new 7.5% property-transfer tax on non-resident buyers since May. However, though fewer homes are selling, prices keep climbing. The average paid by a resident buyer hit a record €258,832, up 11.8% in a year, so even with international money stepping back, the affordability problem for people who actually live here is getting worse, not better.

Portugal was among the EU countries hardest hit by US tariffs. Portuguese goods exports to the US fell around 5% in volume in 2025, the sixth-steepest drop in the bloc, knocking roughly 0.1 point off national growth, with wood and cork, plastics and minerals the most exposed sectors. Europe as a whole weathered the tariffs better than feared, exports ended the year roughly flat, but Portugal did not get off as lightly. The European Commission's sharper warning, though, is that the bigger long-term threat may not be Washington at all but Beijing: Chinese imports into the EU jumped 9% last year, and it wants to avoid European manufacturers being squeezed out.

The EU is taking Portugal to court, again. The European Commission has opened two infringement proceedings against Portugal for missing deadlines to write EU environmental law into its own statute books, one on rules promoting hydrogen and low-carbon gases, the other on tighter limits for industrial and livestock emissions. The emissions directive also creates a new right to compensation for people whose health is harmed by illegal pollution. Portugal now has to respond or risk the case escalating. It is a bureaucratic story on the surface, but the underlying theme, Portugal repeatedly late transposing EU law, is a recurring one.

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🍽️ SPOT OF THE DAY

FIFTY SECONDS (PARQUE DAS NAÇÕES)

A splurge for the weekend, and one of the genuinely special meals in the country. Fifty Seconds sits 120 metres up, at the top of the Vasco da Gama Tower on the riverfront in Parque das Nações, and it takes its name from the panoramic lift ride to reach it. It is the only restaurant outside Spain from Martín Berasategui, the most Michelin-starred chef on the Iberian Peninsula, and this year it climbed to two Michelin stars.

What you get is a tasting-menu experience, technically precise, built on top Portuguese ingredients with Berasategui's Basque signatures woven through, including classics like his caramelised foie gras mille-feuille that have followed him for years. The room seats only about forty, the service is polished without being stiff, and the view over the Tagus does half the work before the food even arrives. This is a special-occasion, book-well-ahead, dress-up sort of place, and priced accordingly, but for an anniversary or a proper celebration it is hard to beat in Lisbon.

It serves lunch on Saturdays (12:30 to 2pm) and dinner Tuesday to Saturday, and is closed Sundays and Mondays. Booking is essential.

→ Find them here ←

Insider tip: book the Saturday lunch sitting rather than dinner if the price gives you pause, you get the same kitchen, the same view, and the daylight panorama over the river, often for a little less than the full evening experience.

📅 WHAT'S ON

See you tomorrow morning.

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