BREXIT - Is This Really Still Rumbling On? 😴

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  • “New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!
  • Pross
    Pross Posts: 40,213
    Bloody leftie media with their Project Fear scaremongering.
  • JimD666
    JimD666 Posts: 1,900
    Penzance fuel stations: Tesco - No fuel, Sainsburys and Morrisons No Diesel.
    Too many idiots to count. :s
  • Dorset_Boy
    Dorset_Boy Posts: 6,873
    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.
  • I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
  • Pross
    Pross Posts: 40,213

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,508
    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
  • pangolin
    pangolin Posts: 6,279

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    - Genesis Croix de Fer
    - Dolan Tuono
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,508
    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.

  • pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
  • rjsterry
    rjsterry Posts: 27,484
    Well the petrol shortage that isn't a shortage has now stopped Mrs RJS from taking her mother back to Bristol. Three local stations out of fuel.
    1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
    Pinnacle Monzonite

    Part of the anti-growth coalition
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,508

    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.
  • Pross
    Pross Posts: 40,213
    The petrol station by my house was empty last night so I filled up then with no problems. It was quiet this morning too but I went out half an hour ago and queues were forming. It was also noticeable that the price had gone up by 1p per litre.
  • pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
  • Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    The UK voted brexit 5yrs ago and hauliers have done bugg3r all to attract drivers back into HGVs since.
  • pblakeney
    pblakeney Posts: 25,590
    Here is a question? Have the number of drivers dropped dramatically in the last month? I'd suggest the fuel problem exists mostly due to reporting and muppets.
    The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
    I am not sure. You have no chance.
    Veronese68 wrote:
    PB is the most sensible person on here.
  • pblakeney said:

    Here is a question? Have the number of drivers dropped dramatically in the last month? I'd suggest the fuel problem exists mostly due to reporting and muppets.

    It's like peston standing outside northern rock all over again.
  • ddraver
    ddraver Posts: 26,348
    JimD666 said:

    Penzance fuel stations: Tesco - No fuel, Sainsburys and Morrisons No Diesel.
    Too many idiots to count. :s

    Excellent!

    Liskeard Morrisons was shuting it's self serve pumps at 2100 tonight. I assume the others are going to be rationed from them.

    The little village one I pass was closed too (but that might just be the day). Given that they seemed to have upped their price the last few days beyond even the Trunk Route services, I rather think that's karma
    We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
    - @ddraver
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,508

    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.
  • ddraver
    ddraver Posts: 26,348

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    I have no real source for this but from my brief rub up against home delivery driving, no qualified HGV driver would choose home delivery over trucks.

    Zero Hours/ "self" employed (lol) delivery driving is a genuine scandal waiting to happen.
    We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
    - @ddraver
  • Dorset_Boy
    Dorset_Boy Posts: 6,873
    ddraver said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    I have no real source for this but from my brief rub up against home delivery driving, no qualified HGV driver would choose home delivery over trucks.

    Zero Hours/ "self" employed (lol) delivery driving is a genuine scandal waiting to happen.
    Are the supermarket delivery drivers on zero hours contracts? I have no idea.
    I imagine a significant number of the amazon / DPD / Hermes types are though.
  • ddraver
    ddraver Posts: 26,348
    I don't know. At a guess I'd say Zero Hours but properly 'employed'
    We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
    - @ddraver
  • ddraver said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    I have no real source for this but from my brief rub up against home delivery driving, no qualified HGV driver would choose home delivery over trucks.

    Zero Hours/ "self" employed (lol) delivery driving is a genuine scandal waiting to happen.
    The delivery firms like it how it is, but without imported scab labour they will have to improve conditions. That's what's going on right now, this is what brexit was all about for working class voters and why they felt left behind.
  • pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.

    Neither do I, but I'm guessing that haulage companies would find a way to use it to keep costs down, as that's one of the central benefits of capitalism & free markets. It reminds me of the sorts of tax schemes which are introduced for specific reasons (for instance, to promote some sort of structural rebalancing), but then get aggressively used in creative ways to reduce tax bills, without the intended desired effect, and end up being 'loopholes' which chancellors then try to plug (mostly unsuccessfully).

    The market always seems to find a way.

    And, as I say, I suspect drivers would still find themselves 10 minutes away from home and out of hours just as often.
  • ddraver
    ddraver Posts: 26,348

    ddraver said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    I have no real source for this but from my brief rub up against home delivery driving, no qualified HGV driver would choose home delivery over trucks.

    Zero Hours/ "self" employed (lol) delivery driving is a genuine scandal waiting to happen.
    The delivery firms like it how it is, but without imported scab labour they will have to improve conditions. That's what's going on right now, this is what brexit was all about for working class voters and why they felt left behind.
    Yes, I feel like you may have mentioned this a few times.

    It's not happening though.
    We're in danger of confusing passion with incompetence
    - @ddraver
  • pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.

    Neither do I, but I'm guessing that haulage companies would find a way to use it to keep costs down, as that's one of the central benefits of capitalism & free markets. It reminds me of the sorts of tax schemes which are introduced for specific reasons (for instance, to promote some sort of structural rebalancing), but then get aggressively used in creative ways to reduce tax bills, without the intended desired effect, and end up being 'loopholes' which chancellors then try to plug (mostly unsuccessfully).

    The market always seems to find a way.

    And, as I say, I suspect drivers would still find themselves 10 minutes away from home and out of hours just as often.
    If they are ten mins from home they could have a bike in the back of the cab.
  • TheBigBean
    TheBigBean Posts: 20,508

    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.

    Neither do I, but I'm guessing that haulage companies would find a way to use it to keep costs down, as that's one of the central benefits of capitalism & free markets. It reminds me of the sorts of tax schemes which are introduced for specific reasons (for instance, to promote some sort of structural rebalancing), but then get aggressively used in creative ways to reduce tax bills, without the intended desired effect, and end up being 'loopholes' which chancellors then try to plug (mostly unsuccessfully).

    The market always seems to find a way.

    And, as I say, I suspect drivers would still find themselves 10 minutes away from home and out of hours just as often.
    If they are ten mins from home they could have a bike in the back of the cab.
    It's not allowed apparently. They need to stay with their truck. Otherwise, they could just get someone to pick them up.
  • rick_chasey
    rick_chasey Posts: 72,225

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    The UK voted brexit 5yrs ago and hauliers have done bugg3r all to attract drivers back into HGVs since.
    IR35 is doing a lot of work putting drivers off, as are corona restrictions plus fannying around with Brexit paperwork (eg “welcome to the Brexit sir”).

    If it was just about wages you wouldn’t have seen a spike in retirement.
  • pangolin
    pangolin Posts: 6,279

    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.

    Neither do I, but I'm guessing that haulage companies would find a way to use it to keep costs down, as that's one of the central benefits of capitalism & free markets. It reminds me of the sorts of tax schemes which are introduced for specific reasons (for instance, to promote some sort of structural rebalancing), but then get aggressively used in creative ways to reduce tax bills, without the intended desired effect, and end up being 'loopholes' which chancellors then try to plug (mostly unsuccessfully).

    The market always seems to find a way.

    And, as I say, I suspect drivers would still find themselves 10 minutes away from home and out of hours just as often.
    If they are ten mins from home they could have a bike in the back of the cab.
    It's not allowed apparently. They need to stay with their truck. Otherwise, they could just get someone to pick them up.
    Brian's made the point but, wherever a new line in the sand is drawn, some people will end up tantalisingly close to home.
    - Genesis Croix de Fer
    - Dolan Tuono
  • pangolin said:

    pangolin said:

    Pross said:

    I was told by someone today that there's a serious shortage of HGV drivers across Europe too, to the tune of about 500,000. No idea if it is correct, but was from someone sensible. His guess was they have switched to the home delivery sector.

    As posted well up thread, EU migration has been used to suppress wages and working conditions for decades. The clamour from industry is to continue a suppression of wages and conditions in those sectors by importing "scab" labour. To see the right-wing press supporting this but having baulked at staying in the Single Market due to "Forin workers" is laughable. The current crisis is precipitated by the hauliers to maintain a suppression of wages and conditions.
    Before the inevitable u turn on visas the Government's bright idea was apparently going to be to ease the restrictions on working hours those pesky Europeans imposed. I'm not sure how that was going to improve working conditions.
    Fewer nights sleeping in a truck.
    Because you crash sooner?
    No. If you hit the hours limit when you are 10 mins from home, then you get to sleep in the truck and complete the remaining 10 mins the next day.


    Unfortunately there's no easy answer to that, unless you just make all the restrictions fuzzy. And you can bet your bottom Euro that if they were fuzzy, they'd be exploited, and you'd end up with a de facto increase in driving hours.
    The suggestion I saw from one driver was to allow him to increase his limit by one hour once a month if required, and only on a home leg. It seemed that would make a meaningful difference to him.

    Sounds nice in theory, but how do you stop employers simply putting in an extra hour on one home leg once a month to exploit it? And what happens if they are 10 minutes short of home at the end of that one hour?
    I presume by making it apply in one direction only it would be much harder to do that as the employer should consider the same number of hours each way. That said, I know nothing about the sector.

    Neither do I, but I'm guessing that haulage companies would find a way to use it to keep costs down, as that's one of the central benefits of capitalism & free markets. It reminds me of the sorts of tax schemes which are introduced for specific reasons (for instance, to promote some sort of structural rebalancing), but then get aggressively used in creative ways to reduce tax bills, without the intended desired effect, and end up being 'loopholes' which chancellors then try to plug (mostly unsuccessfully).

    The market always seems to find a way.

    And, as I say, I suspect drivers would still find themselves 10 minutes away from home and out of hours just as often.
    If they are ten mins from home they could have a bike in the back of the cab.
    It's not allowed apparently. They need to stay with their truck. Otherwise, they could just get someone to pick them up.
    Brian's made the point but, wherever a new line in the sand is drawn, some people will end up tantalisingly close to home.

    They could always try the ruse a coach driver once made, when I was in charge of a group of young musicians on a coach trip to London, and the (sole) driver made the idiotic decision to route through the West End on a Friday night: as we were then a good hour late arriving, and he needed nine hours out of the coach, it was going to screw up our plans for the next day, so he asked if we'd like him to drive on his brother's tacho, which he happened to have with him.

    We caught a tube the next morning to our London destination. He caught up later, on his own tacho.