Who has taken them!

[doctor Bob]

Media still on about fuel crisis, I'm SE and everybody at work filled up today no issues. No panic as we all had enough last week.

 

[flying haggis]

alarm bells have been ringing, the Road Haulage association has been warning the govt for years.

But shouldnt the RHA have been campaigning amongst members to employ and train new drivers rather than rely on "cheap" foreign labour. But of course that might have meant proper wages for the British drivers...........

 

[Spectric]

We import a lot of cheap foreign goods so cheap foreign labour is just another way to increase profit margins. The trouble is that there is a massive shortage of people needed to work in hospitality, retail and tourism up here, not a problem when they could use foreign labour whilst a lot of locals found life better being civil servants and getting every benefit possible. Now very little foreign labour, great for the landlords because they can get ten times the rent from tourist as holiday lets but every business is short staffed to the point they cannot keep going long term but again the locals don't like having to get up for work and earn less income, much better on income support but what is the local jobcentre doing about it, well basically Jack shiete which is really stupid but I suppose they cannot upset someones human rights can they.

 

[baldkev]

Theres also wages to consider..... years ago i believe hgv drivers were very well paid, whereas now it's not all that great ( certainly around here )

 

[Terry - Somerset]

Consumers make buying decisions largely (but not exclusively) on price. These pressures ripple down the supply chain to all those involved.

For ~30 years cost reduction has been largely unimpeded. Staff across EU recruited. Materials, machines, subassemblies, products etc shipped at low cost around the world. War, civil unrest, trade barriers have been largely absent.

The result - very complex supply chains and minimal stock holding to limit investment. All targetted at low costs. It has worked consistently for decades.

Unsurprisingly Covid and Brexit have exposed serious weaknesses. Brexit creates significant barriers on trade with EU despite what Boris may have intended. Covid has disrupted supply and demand patterns globally as different countries deal with the virus impacts.

Most companies (and governments) will be reassessing whether existing practices need to change radically. Resilience costs money - create spare capacity, simplify supply chains, embrace local manufacture, duplicate material sourcing etc.

IMHO we have not seen the last of the fall out.

 

[Droogs]

You can't do anything about weight - a ton of bricks is a ton of bricks - but if you look around a supermarket you realise a lot of volume is just air. Stop shipping air. Sugar Puffs minus the puff. Corn, not cornflakes. Ban pasta that has a hole - spaghetti fine, penne is space inefficient. Suck the gas out of bags of crisps. Trebor mints, no Polos. As for the ambassadors Ferrero Rocher, pass them between heavy rollers and sell them as slabs. Marsh, without the mallow. Gouda good, emmental bad (space wasting holes). Nice cuboid choc ices, no wasteful delicate cornettos. I bet we can save 40% of the lorry trips to supermarkets, and there must be other ways to save space on a whole load of goods.

You are aware that because of physics mumbo jumbo (atmospheric pressure), air doesn't have any effect of the weight of a packet of sugar puffs nor on the laen weight of a lorry

 

[Keith 66]

It is a combination of many things that have coincided at once, lorry drivers used to be well paid like many other trades but wages were driven lower by cheap labour. All our money has been devalued in real terms & is continuing to do so. People get old & you have to have new young people coming in the bottom to replace those retiring or leaving any profession. It was reported yesterday that the DVLA has a waiting list of 54,000 HGV licence applications, Some of these or maybe more will be licence renewals, So if you are a driver & your licence has run out you are not going anywhere!
Working conditions are another big factor. There were two truck stops within 5 miles of where i sit, both are gone replaced by housing estates. There used to be many of these where you could pull up have a meal, toilets sleep.
Now all you see is bottles full of water alongside laybys on any main road. Is it any wonder young people dont think its a good job?

 

[Adam W.]

The universities took them to study media studies in the 90's and they never came back.

Who wants to be a lorry driver anyway ?

 

[paulrbarnard]

You are aware that because of physics mumbo jumbo (atmospheric pressure), air doesn't have any effect of the weight of a packet of sugar puffs nor on the laen weight of a lorry

But it does impact the volume meaning you need might more trucks to ship those sugar puffs

 

[Terrytpot]

Under EU rules, any carrier (and airlines are a good example) could trade between any 2 points - a Norbert Detressangle truck could have come to the UK with French goods, drop them in (say) Leeds, take a UK load from Leeds to Dagenham, then a return load to France. But now we are no longer in the EU I don't think they can do that middle bit - UK to UK

I do have one partial answer. One driver - one truck so it makes sense to have the truck as full as possible. I'm sure schedulers are very good at that, it's the way to make the whole system affordable and profitable. But what does full mean? Capacity is limited by weight and volume.

You can't do anything about weight - a ton of bricks is a ton of bricks - but if you look around a supermarket you realise a lot of volume is just air. Stop shipping air. Sugar Puffs minus the puff. Corn, not cornflakes. Ban pasta that has a hole - spaghetti fine, penne is space inefficient. Suck the gas out of bags of crisps. Trebor mints, no Polos.

Being an HGV driver for over 25 years I have a comment or two to make..
norberts got bought by XPO and even pre departure of the eu that middle bit could have qualified as cabotage so still may not have been permitted but as there was no one to enforce that legislation a lot of work was lost for uk companies.

My current firm runs 15 trucks…today we have 26 runs scheduled to take place arguing that one driver per truck is perhaps not the vehicles most efficient use. This could make you think you were right about scheduler’s being efficient until you see what the vehicle actually does during it’s shift!

Hmm,weight. There are very few loads on the road getting anywhere near load capacity. Most trucks are plated to run upto 44tons but only bulk products get anywhere near those limits eg steel,gypsum,liquids or raw materials. Unfortunately all of those “raw materials“ come in quantities that large that your average destination capable of handling them has to be a processor/fabricator and they occupy large quantities of real estate. Your average RDC’s handle far more visits and their loads are already downsized to consumer level’s (although still large amounts of them) but these will generally fall far short of weight limits unless you go Euclidean and just deliver liquids.

Long story short,it’s a job where double most jobs input is required from not Just you but also your family and where the emphasis has been to try and cut cost’s to be competitive for so long and with the price of fuel being the highest impediment the drivers wage has always been the easiest target, hence the influx over the last decades of cheaper labour from the eastern block. Shut that particular door and this is what happens.

 

[Richard_C]

But it does impact the volume meaning you need might more trucks to ship those sugar puffs

Exactly my point. I know that mass doesn't change unless you manage to use sugar puffs in a nuclear reaction. But I bet you can get 30 tons of sugar puffs in a lorry load if you compress them.

 

[DavidConnelly]

You realise that many EU drivers were no longer welcome to operate in the UK when "freedom of movement" ended?

Hence the issuing of the temporary visas to band-aid the issue.

I thought this was common knowledge, or am i miss understanding your question?

I have friends who have been living in the UK for over 10 years as a working family. He is an HGV driver, she is a nurse. Both are law abiding.
Both were refused visa extensions and had to return home to mainland Europe. The kids were taken out of school and are missing their friends.
So here we are, a well educated, hard working, tax paying family who had made their home in England forced to leave by the UK govt. You reap what you sew.
There's been a shortage of nurses for a long time too.

 

[Richard_C]

ou are aware that because of physics mumbo jumbo (atmospheric pressure), air doesn't have any effect of the weight of a packet of sugar puffs nor on the laen weight of a lorry

Yes. You are aware that a lorry has a weight limit and a length-height-width limit and can't have more space on the inside than it occupies on the outside?

 

[Glitch]

The reasons I've heard are:

Pre-Covid, Pre-Brexit shortage of 60,000 HGV drivers
Aging UK workforce not being replaced by UK youngsters who are told they need to go to university
Aging UK workforce retiring early due to pay and conditions, Covid, additional tests required
Number of HGV driver tests plummeted
Pay suppressed by cheaper workers from abroad
Dreadful working conditions, especially during Covid - lack of safe places to stop, showers/toilets closed
PITA driving in towns - bus lanes, cycle lanes, LTNs, traffic light phasing,
Loss of cabotage (as described above)

In my opinion if you rely on 'temporary' workers from abroad then there is always the risk of external factors that cause them to return home.
Those that want to put down roots here have applied for settled status.
Covid comes along, work dries up or you get furloughed it far cheaper/safer/profitable to return home

 

[Droogs]

No! But it explains why I keep getting fired, by that volunteer Dr. WHO keeps sending me contracts though

 

[Glitch]

I have friends who have been living in the UK for over 10 years as a working family. He is an HGV driver, she is a nurse. Both are law abiding.
Both were refused visa extensions and had to return home to mainland Europe. The kids were taken out of school and are missing their friends.
So here we are, a well educated, hard working, tax paying family who had made their home in England forced to leave by the UK govt. You reap what you sew.
There's been a shortage of nurses for a long time too.

What visa? They'ed have been here under FoM.

10 years here they could have applied for settled status. It's wasn't difficult. My wife is UK born of Italian parents. We had to apply for my Father in Law and her Aunt, plus her cousin's husband. Plus we know several other Italian nationals who have been here for decades that successfully applied.

 

[Droogs]

Exactly my point. I know that mass doesn't change unless you manage to use sugar puffs in a nuclear reaction. But I bet you can get 30 tons of sugar puffs in a lorry load if you compress them.

Wont that just be a tractor with a harvest wagon full of wheat? Mind you, we don't have any farmers either. ah well

 

[stuart little]

Are you absolutely sure that a global pandemic with complete economic shutdown had nothing to do with it whatsoever? Not even a little bit?

Exactly,,I've read an article by Iain Duncan-Smith who claims it's Covid that's the culprit. All Europe & USA are short of drivers. Shut downs & furlough sent the HGV drivers home, many ended up finding other jobs or retiring etc.. If drivers already worked over here, surely it would've been relatively easy to get visas?

Are you absolutely sure that a global pandemic with complete economic shutdown had nothing to do with it whatsoever? Not even a little bit?

 

[stuart little]

The universities took them to study media studies in the 90's and they never came back.

Who wants to be a lorry driver anyway ?

I did some HGV driving in the late 70's &early 80's but with today's traffic conditions No-way would I want to be out there with the 'silly person brigade' - I haven't bothered to drive since Covid 'took over', my cars's on SORN & there it can stay indeff..

 

[Cooper]

I wonder, and its a genuine wonder, what effect rules on intra-country working have had. Under EU rules, any carrier (and airlines are a good example) could trade between any 2 points - a Norbert Detressangle truck could have come to the UK with French goods, drop them in (say) Leeds, take a UK load from Leeds to Dagenham, then a return load to France. But now we are no longer in the EU I don't think they can do that middle bit - UK to UK - and maybe that affects capacity.

I'm sure this is a large part of the problem.
Also the price wars between supermarket chains squeezes delivery company margins and if they could get drivers from elsewhere rather than pay the thousands it costs to train their own it must have been almost a no brainer. It can't help that conditions drivers have to accept are so unpleasant.