No need for that - plenty of fuel in the country it is simply the public Henny Pennies who have created the shortage.
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Don't Panic
- Thread starter WaveJumper
- Start date
No need for that - plenty of fuel in the country it is simply the public Henny Pennies who have created the shortage.
You might have mentioned this earlier @Newchodge I just queued for for over an hour at Tesco to get my unleaded
Did you want the fuel or did you need it? If want I have no sympathy, if need then you do have my sympathy.
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Deleted member 59730
Only according to the right wing pro-Brexit press.
Shooting the messenger for bad news has always been a way to deflect blame.
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"queues and closures at fuel stations were a "manufactured situation" and sources have pointed to the Road Haulage Association (RHA) led by Remainer and ex-BBC chief Rod McKenzie"
ALL the press picked up on his statement and created the panic. The editorial teams of our newspapers need to go back to school.
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Deleted member 59730
But this comes from Grant Shapps a Tory Brexiteer! Doesn't make it true.
And just how did Shapps make his money? By promoting software to steal other peoples web content. Hardly a paragon of truth.
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As i posted in another thread i spent a fair amount of time on saturday with a tanker driving mate. In his opinion what we are looking at here is a small issue that has been turned into a huge crisis by the press and inept politicians
The actual issue initial is sub contract tanker logistics companies cant find agency drivers with HGV + ADR for the rate they can afford to make a profit which is because Brexit has caused a general shortage of HGV drivers and any tanker driver can do normal HGV but not the other way around - and why not take extra £ for a less dangerous / stressful job.
So indirectly Brexit related (in terms of general HGV driver shortage being partly Brexit related) but should have just been a couple of firms struggling with supplies while they found a new logistic supplier (or upped their payments) and instead has been whipped up into a mad panic
The actual issue initial is sub contract tanker logistics companies cant find agency drivers with HGV + ADR for the rate they can afford to make a profit which is because Brexit has caused a general shortage of HGV drivers and any tanker driver can do normal HGV but not the other way around - and why not take extra £ for a less dangerous / stressful job.
So indirectly Brexit related (in terms of general HGV driver shortage being partly Brexit related) but should have just been a couple of firms struggling with supplies while they found a new logistic supplier (or upped their payments) and instead has been whipped up into a mad panic
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Deleted member 59730
Have you not noticed that it IS the tories that are the government. Who else is responsible for running the country?
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Did not take long - the written and social media and ignorant population had no part to play in perpetrating this and other false shortages.
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The whole situation has been caused by human nature, not any specific political party.
In my experience, conversations on the subject go like this:
"I went out to get petrol this morning and it was absolutely mad. Bloody panic buyers are going absolutely mad again"
"That's a pain, were you really low on fuel?"
"Not really, but I didn't want to get low and then find I couldn't get any."
In my experience, conversations on the subject go like this:
"I went out to get petrol this morning and it was absolutely mad. Bloody panic buyers are going absolutely mad again"
"That's a pain, were you really low on fuel?"
"Not really, but I didn't want to get low and then find I couldn't get any."
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I tend to agree that the current fuel problem is not the direct, immediate fault of the government.
However the government is responsible for:
10s of thousands of HGV drivers leaving the country
Delays in issuing some 50,000 HGV licences
Delays in training and testing a large number of potential HGV drivers
Doing nothing despite being aware of a huge shortage of HGV drivers
The knowledge that there is a shortage of HGV drivers and that shortages of some goods are happening helped cause the panic buying response to a normal situation (a few forecourts closing temporarily because of supply issues).
Am I cynical to wonder how much the fuel companies themselves helped spread the panic to give them an excuse for eye-watering price increases?
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Are there a large number of people applying for HGV licenses?
It's not the Government that trains them.
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To give you an idea of their completely closed thinking on driving licences
To ride a motorcycle/moped on L plates you need a CBT, CBT's cost c£120 and last 2 years
My daughter took hers in July 2019 so it was due to run out in July 21, her original plan was to take lessons, pass her test then ride the same bike without Lplates. However Covid stopped all lessons and tests, despite that the govt didnt extend CBT's like they did MOT's and other things, hence she was left rushing around in May as restrictions lifted to find a training company that had a slot she could book to take her cbt on her bike as if it has expired by even 1 day she would have to use a training company bike at extra cost. When she did it, every other person was delivery riders getting their re-validated for an extra 2 yrs
We had written to the gov via our MP but the reply was that in their view motorcycle usage was mainly leisure so whilst they would keep an eye on it they didnt think it warranted special consideration. So no key workers or students use them for commuting at all....
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The gov stopped all testing under covid rules (cant have 2 in a cab together) but drivers continued to age and retire. When you apply you have to get a provisional HGV before you can start to train, thoise are meant to take 2 weeks but currently have been taking much longer (industrial action at DVLA + covid)
There was a guy from Pertemps on the news this am, they are running a training scheme - if I remember rightly they have 48 signed up for the first batch of training and are waiting on Provisionals, they had several thousand apply
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Also until they relaxed it this April when you did your periodic renewal you had to provide a medical report on fitness to drive - but Dr's weren't doing appointments under govt guidance
Honestly - trade bodies had been pointing out the brick wall fast approaching but the gov kept kicking the can down the road thinking it would magically sort itself
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Deleted member 59730
Years ago I had a good friend who worked in the manpower forecasting department in Whitehall. I am sure there is something similar today. The govt should know before anyone else. If they don't and do nothing one has to ask what the hell they are doing running the country,
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The problem is that for years nobody wanted to be an HGV driver - whether they do suddenly now in a period of rising wages is a bit irrelevant.
It is another example of the govt (by which i mean all flavours) reacting to a crisis rather than proactively heading it off in advance
The next one will be if we ever get around to implementing the border checks on inbound goods as we do not have enough trained vetinary staff to carry out even a small % of what is needed and that has been pointed out ever since 2016 as well yet there have been no new qualifications or training courses created
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Correct me if I'm wrong, I've read that the transport companies used to maintain their own training and driver development programmes until foreign drivers could be recruited much cheaper during the 1990's. For that reason this format went by the board and now they are reaping the cost of this.
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Almost. Before foreign drivers there was an issue with some companies running apprenticeships, training drivers, paying for their licences and so on. The sort of thing any good employer would do. Then a newcomer thought up the brilliant idea of paying a bit more but only recruiting trained and licensed drivers who deserted the good employers in droves. So the good employers became less good. Then drivers were required to pay for their own training and testing - no licence, no job. Then a brilliant haulage company came up with the idea of making their drivers self employed so no holiday pay, sick pay, pension, employment rights. No overnight accommodation, no showers, no toilets ....... Drivers were bewildered and got scooped up by umbrella companies who fleeced them. So many drivers left and foreign drivers were brought in on similar terms, replacing the disgruntled professional drivers from this country who had enough of being treated like s**t. The problem has been developing for about 20 years and successive governments have let the haulage companies (with a couple of notable exceptions) get on with it as they were making profits.
Now the haulage companies are screaming about the problem they created and the government is denying reponsibility for the problem they (and their predecessors of whatever colour) allowed to develop.
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Deleted member 59730
It came about because of the rise in agencies or brokers finding return loads. Foreign EU driver delivers to the UK and wanted a return load but was offered other trips by the broker inside the UK. Eastern EU drivers found this to be a big advantage as they were earning better money for loads here. French and Germans were not so keen because they didn't like the food and the dirt at the toilet facilities.
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Which is why we are now seeing rising inflation
For years we became hooked on cheap labour be it people from the eastern EU working fro far below what their skills were worth or people working through umbrella/ PSC's allowing them to charge an hourly rate that only made sense if you were not paying full % tax/NI
Now the trouble is a vast number of people are now saying "good this will see wages rise to proper levels" but not stopping to think that those wages will feed through into higher prices in the shops/utilities/energy etc which will then feed through into higher wage demands etc etc.
Currently we have no way of knowing whether the increase in wages (on average) will be higher than the rise in prices (on average) which is good (on average) for the country or if the rise in wages will be less than the rise in prices which will see us worse off (on average)
For years we became hooked on cheap labour be it people from the eastern EU working fro far below what their skills were worth or people working through umbrella/ PSC's allowing them to charge an hourly rate that only made sense if you were not paying full % tax/NI
Now the trouble is a vast number of people are now saying "good this will see wages rise to proper levels" but not stopping to think that those wages will feed through into higher prices in the shops/utilities/energy etc which will then feed through into higher wage demands etc etc.
Currently we have no way of knowing whether the increase in wages (on average) will be higher than the rise in prices (on average) which is good (on average) for the country or if the rise in wages will be less than the rise in prices which will see us worse off (on average)
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No because if they keep at least the double lock then their pensions will go up by inflation anyway - OAP's are much better insulated than working people
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Full disclosure I worked in IT recruitment from 93 onwards and over that time i saw the use of PSC go from just high end specialists gradually down the value chain until suddenly there were umbrellas getting people in warehouses to work through them with promises of blanket claiming of subsistence expenses etc whilst the recruitment businesses involved got out of paying employers NI contributions. It was obvious that at some point the exchequer was going to get annoyed and come down like a ton of bricks on it.
And when companies like GIANT were offering £100 referral bonuses for every person pushed their way it was also obvious someone (not the worker) was making a lot of money out of it.
I was glad i did 95% perm but it was getting harder and harder to persuade companies (generally the larger firms were worst) that they would be better employing their staff and not fake outsourcing it by employing contractors for what are actually core business activities ( i am thinking of a large originally mail order became web sales company that outsourced all it's warehouse, IT and web functions)
And when companies like GIANT were offering £100 referral bonuses for every person pushed their way it was also obvious someone (not the worker) was making a lot of money out of it.
I was glad i did 95% perm but it was getting harder and harder to persuade companies (generally the larger firms were worst) that they would be better employing their staff and not fake outsourcing it by employing contractors for what are actually core business activities ( i am thinking of a large originally mail order became web sales company that outsourced all it's warehouse, IT and web functions)
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Totally, as far as I am aware it was an issue which had been building since the mid 80's
There were several opportunities to stop things - when i started in recruitment all agencies had to be licenced by the DTi and to have lodged a copy of their terms of business there. We were regulated by the Employment Agencies Act 1974 which was ok but had some holes in it.
When the conduct of employment agencies and recruitment business regulations 2000 was produced licencing stopped, there were some good bits but in an attempt to write in english it is so badly written it has holes throughout it (even before you get to the issue of allowing an opt out)
It is very badly worded in how it says agencies must tell applicants where they are sending their cv's - so badly that many indulge in wilful ignorance. If they had wanted to clean up the entire industry at that point they could have said - "if an introducing agency is shown to have materially broken these regulations then no fee is due"
They could have clearly stated - by the point at which a workers identity is made known to a potential hirer that worker must have been made aware of the identity of the hirer, the likely nature of the work and any h&s implications inherent in the role
rather than this which requires you to go see what reg 18 says and uses the undefined condition of "offers a work-seeker a position"
21.—(1) Subject to paragraph (3), an agency or employment business shall ensure that at the same time as—
it offers a work-seeker a position with a hirer—
(i)it gives to the work-seeker (whether orally or otherwise) all information it has been provided with about the matters referred to in paragraphs (a) to (e) and, where applicable, paragraph (f) of regulation 18; and
For those that care here is reg 18
18. Neither an agency nor an employment business may introduce or supply a work-seeker to a hirer unless the agency or employment business has obtained sufficient information from the hirer to select a suitable work-seeker for the position which the hirer seeks to fill, including the following information—
(a)the identity of the hirer and, if applicable, the nature of the hirer’s business;
(b)the date on which the hirer requires a work-seeker to commence work and the duration, or likely duration, of the work;
(c)the position which the hirer seeks to fill, including the type of work a work-seeker in that position would be required to do, the location at which and the hours during which he would be required to work and any risks to health or safety known to the hirer and what steps the hirer has taken to prevent or control such risks;
(d)the experience, training, qualifications and any authorisation which the hirer considers are necessary, or which are required by law, or by any professional body, for a work-seeker to possess in order to work in the position;
(e)any expenses payable by or to the work-seeker; and
(f)in the case of an agency—
(i)the minimum rate of remuneration and any other benefits which the hirer would offer to a person in the position which it seeks to fill, and the intervals at which the person would be paid; and
(ii)where applicable, the length of notice which a work-seeker in such a position would be required to give, and entitled to receive, to terminate the employment with the hirer.
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