[News] There's no need to panic buy petrol

[Lindfield by the Pond]

Waiting for the "Filling up my Tesla" as I type...........

 

[Weststander]

Good old BBC, well worth the licence fee.

Radio4 at 5.45-ish this evening cut out all the British bullshitters (on both sides) who always seem to think they know so much about the continent. By talking to the head of the German logistics industry trade body. These are the facts:

- The shortage of HGV drivers is continental wide.
- Germany is short by 60,000, which worsens by 15,000 per annum. [100,000 in the UK apparently].
- Continental countries at present are not suffering the effect on goods/fuel supply to the extent we see here.
- It’s a long term structural change. Young people aren’t prepared to work long days or stay away from home.
- Increasing pay in Germany hasn’t solved this. Young continentals and Brits simply don’t want to be HGV drivers.
- Germany has not found that Eastern European drivers will solve their issues at all. They simply have no idea how they’re going to crack the ever growing driver shortage.

To me it’s interesting about the career/job choices of young people across all of Europe. Have people got more and more fussy as we’ve become more civilised or economies have matured? People would rather work in a supermarket or be unemployed than take a career with long hours it appears.

 

[Driver8]

Waiting for the "Filling up my Tesla" as I type...........

Mine’s already full [emoji106].

 

[nickbrighton]

Good old BBC, well worth the licence fee.

Radio4 at 5.45-ish this evening cut out all the British bullshitters (on both sides) who always seem to think they know so much about the continent. By talking to the head of the German logistics industry trade body. These are the facts:

- The shortage of HGV drivers is continental wide.
- Germany is short by 60,000, which worsens by 15,000 per annum. [100,000 in the UK apparently].
- Continental countries at present are not suffering the effect on goods/fuel supply to the extent we see here.
- It’s a long term structural change. Young people aren’t prepared to work long days or stay away from home.
- Increasing pay in Germany hasn’t solved this. Young continentals and Brits simply don’t want to be HGV drivers.
- Germany has not found that Eastern European drivers will solve their issues at all. They simply have no idea how they’re going to crack the ever growing driver shortage.

To me it’s interesting about the career/job choices of young people across all of Europe. Have people got more and more fussy as we’ve become more civilised or economies have matured? People would rather work in a supermarket or be unemployed than take a career with long hours it appears.

thats really interesting, thank you. Shame the BBC didnt do an equally good job on the fuel thing!
As its a general thing rather than an UK issue alone, it does seem that the "easy solution" of making HGV a "skill shortage occupation wont help

 

[beorhthelm]

IMO this story had not been sensationalised or engineered to cause a frenzy and has been presented factually.

except the point there wasnt a petrol shortage, only a few sites from one company having problems. until this morning.

 

[Weststander]

thats really interesting, thank you. Shame the BBC didnt do an equally good job on the fuel thing!
As its a general thing rather than an UK issue alone, it does seem that the "easy solution" of making HGV a "skill shortage occupation wont help

They might’ve on R4.

I don’t always listen to R4, but it’s a cut above. Whether it be climate change, pandemic, you name it …. they seem to live in an objective, balanced, non-hyperbolic parallel universe from every other broadcaster including R5!

 

[Lindfield by the Pond]

thats really interesting, thank you. Shame the BBC didnt do an equally good job on the fuel thing!
As its a general thing rather than an UK issue alone, it does seem that the "easy solution" of making HGV a "skill shortage occupation wont help

Automation. Sounds like driverless trucks will (excuse the pun) be accelerated. With this just around the corner, why would you invest your time (and money - its not cheap to get a HGV license) in an industry that will be largely redundant in 5-10 years. Conditions are not good either.

 

[Bozza]

If you're in Worthing and struggling, there's a tanker filling up BP in Findon right now.

I'm not sure which flavour of fuel they've got, or do they carry multiple?

 

[Weststander]

If you're in Worthing and struggling, there's a tanker filling up BP in Findon right now.

I'm not sure which flavour of fuel they've got, or do they carry multiple?

Word spread quickly, too late.

 

[Kalimantan Gull]

but the point is 1% is normal and fine- my husband run petrol stations for years, on any given day a few garages in his area would run out due to late deliveries, driver illness or some such. No one is saying the government have tackled the lorry driver shortage properly- that is a **** up of monumental proportions, we all saw it coming. What we are saying is this "fuel crisis" has been manufactured by the media badly reporting and then the usual ****wits panic buying - an no I dont consider those needing to fill up because they have to get to hospita, or work, or various other reasons panic buying. I do consider a lot of people filling up simply because they are 3/4 full the problem

It's 1% on top of those issues you mention. It's also the start of a problem that's been several months in the making, so hopefully this is a bad as it gets but who knows. Look, papers do what papers do, and the public does what the public does. Its all very predictable, to you, to me, to the government. Can't act surprised can we? Best to do something about it in the first place. Loads of stuff going on right now, from shortage of truck drivers to shortage of catering staff to problems in the NHS to shortage of CO2 to electricity companies going bust. And each time the government doesn't seem to act until after its become a big story in the papers, when they suddenly announce a raft of measures.

 

[KZNSeagull]

Well maybe this will mean that a lot more freight will end up on the railways, which will help everyone. Only a need for local HGV drivers then who will be able to manage their hours better, the roads will be less clogged up with lorries and better for the environment I would have thought.

 

[sparkie]

Good old BBC, well worth the licence fee.

Radio4 at 5.45-ish this evening cut out all the British bullshitters (on both sides) who always seem to think they know so much about the continent. By talking to the head of the German logistics industry trade body. These are the facts:

- The shortage of HGV drivers is continental wide.
- Germany is short by 60,000, which worsens by 15,000 per annum. [100,000 in the UK apparently].
- Continental countries at present are not suffering the effect on goods/fuel supply to the extent we see here.
- It’s a long term structural change. Young people aren’t prepared to work long days or stay away from home.
- Increasing pay in Germany hasn’t solved this. Young continentals and Brits simply don’t want to be HGV drivers.
- Germany has not found that Eastern European drivers will solve their issues at all. They simply have no idea how they’re going to crack the ever growing driver shortage.

To me it’s interesting about the career/job choices of young people across all of Europe. Have people got more and more fussy as we’ve become more civilised or economies have matured? People would rather work in a supermarket or be unemployed than take a career with long hours it appears.

To be fair that German expert also said there was no fuel shortages on German forecourts or empty shelves in German supermarkets.

 

[pb21]

except the point there wasnt a petrol shortage, only a few sites from one company having problems. until this morning.

Except, I haven't seen or read anything that has said that there is a shortage. On the contrary, I have seen and read it emphasised that there isn't a shortage of fuel, rather drivers.

 

[drew]

And - there isnt any sun

Solar panels work during daylight, not just direct sunlight.

 

[WATFORD zero]

Good old BBC, well worth the licence fee.

Radio4 at 5.45-ish this evening cut out all the British bullshitters (on both sides) who always seem to think they know so much about the continent. By talking to the head of the German logistics industry trade body. These are the facts:

- The shortage of HGV drivers is continental wide.
- Germany is short by 60,000, which worsens by 15,000 per annum. [100,000 in the UK apparently].
- Continental countries at present are not suffering the effect on goods/fuel supply to the extent we see here.
- It’s a long term structural change. Young people aren’t prepared to work long days or stay away from home.
- Increasing pay in Germany hasn’t solved this. Young continentals and Brits simply don’t want to be HGV drivers.
- Germany has not found that Eastern European drivers will solve their issues at all. They simply have no idea how they’re going to crack the ever growing driver shortage.

To me it’s interesting about the career/job choices of young people across all of Europe. Have people got more and more fussy as we’ve become more civilised or economies have matured? People would rather work in a supermarket or be unemployed than take a career with long hours it appears.

Did they discuss any reasons why the UK shortage is double (population based) that of the Germans ?

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Did they discuss any reasons why the UK shortage is double (population based) that of the Germans ?

That’s the first thing which came to my mind. Whilst there’s a shortage of 45-50k here, if you weight it per population the U.K. shortage is around 3 times that of the U.K. Furthermore, the German situation has been a steady shortage whereas the U.K. has had a massive recent spike.....a sudden spike can’t help.

 

[WATFORD zero]

That’s the first thing which came to my mind. Whilst there’s a shortage of 45-50k here, if you weight it per population the U.K. shortage is around 3 times that of the U.K. Furthermore, the German situation has been a steady shortage whereas the U.K. has had a massive recent spike.....a sudden spike can’t help.

I think you'll find the numbers are 60,000 short in Germany and 100,000 short in the UK. As [MENTION=21158]Weststander[/MENTION] rightly pointed out, it's certainly a problem across Europe and solutions will need to be found, but starting at double the issue that Germany has means it's far more urgent for us.

 

[Paulie Gualtieri]

London Road in Burgess Hill almost blocked with queuing cars - for BP one side and Shell the other. Tesco and Hickstead petrol stations closed.

Even chaos in Cuckfield.

Turned left from the balcombe road to be met with cars driving on the wrong side of the road (fully) at me. I was even beeped and gestured at for considering I had priority on the legal side of the road!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[peterward]

If the petrol stations had a sign stating "Minimum Spend £30" should be sorted

That's actually a good idea. Pay at pump only (to speed it up) and min £30+ would cover the smallest cars from about 1/4 tank left.

 

[Dick Head]

They were there on BBC Breakfast news too. It was a stunning piece of current affairs journalism:

Correspondent: - "How often do you get fuel deliveries?"
Site owner:- "Twice every 10 days."
Correspondent:- "And how long does each delivery last you?"
Site owner:- "Err, 5 days."

Twice every ten days? They might just as well have said thirteen times every sixty five days. Or even once every five days.