Funny, Our Anti British Buddies Insist Brexit Is The Cause Of The Trucker Shortage....

[ToraToraTora]

https://news.sky.com/story/why-is-europe-short-of-lorry-drivers-and-how-bad-is-the-crisis-12423174
....so how was it caused in the EUSSR?

[davebro]

When did we have a pandemic when were in the EU. Please answer giving the years concerned!

[Ryzen]

Joining the Common Market allowed EU drivers to take our well paid drivers jobs and drive wages and conditions down..as it did with many trades. We are now left with the fallout and the DVLA situation wont help. The big re-set is imminent.

[webbo3]

davebro
\\When did we have a pandemic when were in the EU. Please answer giving the years concerned!//

Nothing since 1993 as far as I can remember but I'm pretty sure there were others before and around the world.

Are you saying the EU stops pandemics. ?

[douglas9401]

I imagine Pavel & co don't fancy listening to Colonel Blimp and friends abuse them second time around with 'go back where you came from' and 'stealing our jobs', you know the kind of thing.

And they eat all that foreign muck too.

[sevenOP]

Fasten your seat belt again .... no wait, perhaps you'll not need to as often...

"Bank Of America: Energy Crunch Could Lead To $100 Oil And Economic Crisis"

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Oil-Prices/Bank-Of-America-Energy-Crunch-Could-Lead-To-100-Oil-And-Economic-Crisis.html

[ichkeria]

In any case the shortage is partly due to the consequence of the argument often not unreasonably made by proponents of Brexit: namely British drivers were undercut and undertrained in EU times. Were that the case which it no doubt partly is, then the fact that there is now a shortage exacerbated by Brexit ought ironically to back up that argument up.

[Gromit]

// Joining the Common Market allowed EU drivers to take our well paid drivers jobs and drive wages and conditions down..as it did with many trades //

Not quite right. We joined the EEC in 1973. Freedom of movement didn’t come u TIL 2004.
It was the joining of the EU by former communist countries that led to EAStern European drivers coming here to do driving jobs.

[Hopkirk]

I paid my way to get an HGV licence. I began to wonder if it was worth doing, as the wage levels hardly rose for years. The employers were driving down wage costs (pun intended) by hiring east Europeans.
I voted Brexit, partly because of this.

[jno]

why can't I find any photos of petrol queues in France or Germany? I have tried.

[Hopkirk]

I'm glad to say that employers are beginning to train drivers here again, like they should have been doing all along.

[tonyav]

Not just lorry drivers, Hopkirk. Same in industry to.

[tonyav]

Reply to this ^^^^
The employers were driving down wage costs (pun intended) by hiring east Europeans.
I voted Brexit, partly because of this.

[naomi24]

I don’t recall anyone saying there are petrol queues in France or Germany, Jno. I know they’re short of drivers but obviously in other areas.

[jno]

that suggests the driver shortages in Europe are not as bad as here, then?

[Hopkirk]

If the Labour party had their way, we would still have British workers being undermined by foreign labour.

[Mamyalynne]

Maybe they have sufficient drivers with licences to drive petrol tankers but their shortages lie elsewhere in the system.

[tonyav]

HopkirkIf the Labour party had their way, we would still have British workers being undermined by foreign labour.

Perfectly true, Hopkirk. They haven't represented the British working man for many years now ( very unlikely to get voted back in imo ).

[jno]

possibly, mamya. Whatever the cause, it would indicate that they manage things better there if they are doing without fisticuffs on the forecourts.

https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/fuel-crisis-petrol-station-fights-managers-threatened-angry-drivers-1222137

[New Judge]

//….the Brexiteers on this site and countrywide will never,ever,ever concede that 90% of Britains current problems are all caused by the the self-destructive Brexit vote back in 2016.//

They might if it were true, but simply put it isn’t. So instead of endlessly spouting mindless rhetoric, let’s have a proper look at just one aspect:

//The UK is 100,000 [HGV drivers] short. The 60,000 discrepancy with our EU rivals is due to Brexit.//

Er… no it’s not. Here’s something copied from an earlier post of mine:
=======
“Figures from the Office of National Statistics, show that of the 46,000 drivers who left the haulage industry between 2016 and 2020, only 9,000 - 19 per cent - were EU nationals.
National statistics also show the percentage of EU drivers in the UK workforce has remained steady since Brexit.”
Since 2016 the number of HGV drivers [in the UK] has dropped from 321,000 to 275,000. EU drivers made up 11.5% of the 321k and now make up 10.2% of the 275k (so scarcely any different). In 2016 the industry was already short of 60,000 drivers. It is now short of 100,000. There is scarcely any difference between the rate of loss among EU drivers and that of UK drivers. Hauliers cannot recruit young people into the job because the pay and conditions are so unattractive and the age profile of HGV drivers is steadily rising. The cause of this problem is mis-management by the haulage industry over a lengthy period. Huw Merriman, MP, chairman of the Commons transport committee (and a Remainer, incidentally) points to a report prepared in 2016 which highlighted the haulage industry’s staffing problems and he now suggests that the industry comes up with a plan to address those problems in the business which they are supposed to be managing, instead of constantly asking what the government will do about it.

As I said a few days ago, the government does not run the haulage industry, its directors and managers do.
=====
You can see these figures in this Torygraph report:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/28/blame-haulage-industry-not-brexit-fuel-shortage-says-tory-mp/

It’s a Torygraph article so you may need to press “Escape” as it is loading.

So, far from being responsible for the loss of 60,000 drivers, Brexit is responsible for, at the most, 9,000. However, accepting that the rate of loss among EU drivers was scarcely any different to the rate among UK drivers, it is arguable that even these losses were not a result of Brexit but of the general malaise among HGV drivers – whatever their country of origin - with their lot. It is probable that the same number of losses would have occurred wherever the country of origin of the drivers. That’s because the pay and conditions for HGV drivers – across Europe - is so dire.

//Brexit has meant we can't easily address these issues by filling the vacancies with Romanian & Polish drivers.//

The UK (and in particular the management of large companies) needs to be weaned off the idea that it has a ready made pool of cheap labour available to fill its job vacancies. Directors have had five years to realise that this was no longer going to be the case and they have been woefully inadequate in their preparation.

[tonyav]

The UK (and in particular the management of large companies) needs to be weaned off the idea that it has a ready made pool of cheap labour available to fill its job vacancies. Directors have had five years to realise that this was no longer going to be the case and they have been woefully inadequate in their preparation.

Just that last paragraph ought to get you BA, New Judge. Because it is nail on head.