CANBERRA, Aug. 14 (Xinhua) -- The Australian government will pay rebates from Monday to the purchase cost of new factory-fitted LPG (liquified petroleum gas) powered vehicles as part of a 1.6 billion Australian dollar-program (1.23 billion U.S. dollars) to ease pain of high petrol prices on motorists.

Under the eight-year program announced by Prime Minister John Howard, the rebate for the purchase cost of a new LPG vehicle is 1,000 Australian dollars (770 U.S. dollars).

The rebate to the cost of converting cars to LPG for private use will be 2,000 dollars (1,540 U.S. dollars).

Howard said LPG would, on the fuel bill for a six cylinder vehicle traveling 15,000 kilometers a year, save around 1,400 dollars (1,080 U.S. dollars) a year in fuel costs.

Meanwhile, in order to encourage the use of ethanol-laced fuel, E10, the government will offer up to 20,000 dollars (15,400 U.S. dollars) to service stations to convert their operations to include E10.

However, Australia's largest opposition party the Labor Party said the government's plan was not enough to solve the problem of high petrol prices.

The government would receive 100 billion dollars (77 billion U.S.dollars) from fuel excise over the next eight years, yet was returning just 1.6 billion dollars to the Australian people under the new fuel plan, according to Labor. Enditem