Re: Britain outside the EU
 

perfidiously dead;)

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Will be interesting to see if the UK relaxes any restrictions on European drivers working in the UK or implements other solutions. Arla says it's not suffering from a pingdemic but a lack of drivers.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58012884

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

I hope they accelerate the UK HGV training process. Filling job vacancies ourselves rather than relying on cheap imports from Eastern Europe was rather the point of this exercise.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Accelerating the HGV training process should definitely be the UK's priority priority here. I think the European drivers are seen as a stop gap so aren't necessarily cheap.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Perhaps that is the case now but cheap european drivers in the past is the reason companies didn't need to train drivers.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

I'm struggling to think where 100,000 drivers have 'disappeared' to in the last 6 months. :shrug:

Did they all retire at the same time?
Have they been pinged by the Covid app?
Have they decided on a career change and gone pea picking?

. . . surely 100,000 out of 600,000 weren't foreign and gone home, leaving all those big wages behind ;)

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Agreed that 100,000 is a large number. Some have retired. Some left the UK after lockdown and decided not to return. Plus there will have been a backlog in training built up during lockdowns.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

In his statement about interests, Charles de Gaulle was right then and right now too....

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Lorry drivers wages are £18.5k to £35k for a 50 hour week - not bad, but not "big", imho…

https://nationalcareers.service.gov....vehicle-driver

Also, about 30,000 HGV driving tests were lost last year because of the Covid pandemic.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-englan...shire-57587253

So, any new drivers (which is what a lot would be, to make up the shortfall, would be earning £7.11 an hour for a 50 hour week, including evenings, weekends, and Bank Holidays (and when experienced, £13.46).

Woo hoo!! :shocked:

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Here's a thought, maybe ARLA, a company that deals with deliveries to supermarkets (and we're pretty sure supermarkets won't pay top notch for this), pays their drivers a pretty low wage compared to other haulage firms.

As an example, taken from this Wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arla_Foods_UK

Assuming they do pay low wages, let's also assume that the drivers, seeing a shortage in other areas of haulage, have buggered off to better paid jobs, leaving ARLA in the lurch trying to complete their contracts with those really nice and considerate supermarkets :D

All assumptions of course :Yes:

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

I agree - workers shouldn’t have to subsidise companies profits by having low wages.

btw, the lorry driver wages examples are industry wide, not just ARLA - £7 an hour is a crappy wage, especially when you have to work 50 hours a week to get it.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

https://www.totaljobs.com/salary-che...drivers-salary

... says tge average wage is £32,500

https://uk.indeed.com/cmp/Arla-Foods...%20%C2%A315.21.

Offers ARLA wages: £12.93 per hour which, at 50 weeks/year at 50 hours/week comes to £32,500.

Re: Britain outside the EU
 

Having just looked, Arla are recruiting drivers (or trying to), and offering £12.37 - £16.36 per hour depending on experience etc.

They also produce butter, cheeses, yoghurts etc (which use milk) for retailers . . which doesn't seem to be impacted (at least not mentioned) by a shortage of drivers?


edit: beaten by my colleague Sephiroth ;)