Driver 'shortage': new report, same old story

[GasGas]

No shortage of people with licences, just a shortage of decent employers

http://transportoperator.co.uk/2020/11/ ... ake-wheel/

[robthedog]

No shortage of people with licences, just a shortage of decent employers

http://transportoperator.co.uk/2020/11/ ... ake-wheel/

Pay proper money with sensible hours there wouldn’t be any shortage then who wants to work 60 to 80 hours per week for peanuts except the glory boys and the hard up. No thanks

[Conor]

The House of Commons transport select committee supported Ms Tisdale’s findings in 2016, saying: “We believe that the driver shortage is a shortage of people willing to work in the sector rather than a shortage of people with the right qualifications and licences.....”

Ms Tisdale said: “There are various routes out of this problem. They include looking after drivers; give them self-respect by paying them an attractive rate for sensible hours. We need to be embarrassed at wasting driver time, [and] providing decent facilities at distribution centres, and out on the road.

It isn't rocket science is it? Funny how the companies that do do that such as where I'm at it's dead mans shoes trying to get a job there and they've queues of people wanting to work there.

[Juddian]

Its not just the employers, its whole swathes of the industry how it operates and how it treats drivers, for a prime example i give you the typical RDC where the facilities for (in particular visiting) drivers don't differ greatly from what one might expect to find in a holding cell in some US local jail.
If all i could get was work delvering to the typical supermarket RDC i'd be out of the game too.

The problem with the employers themselves in the hire and reward side in particular is that they've based their business model on selling on cost not service...though there are signs in my own sector this is changing to where it should be, where reliable service and quality product/systems are proving more attractive to customers who have found that cheap isn't necessarily best and promises made when contracts are agreed don't always equate to product delivered a few years down the line.

The big problem within our industry is found mainly within the large 4 or 5 logistics giants, where they base their treatment/recruitment/training of staff on a doomed to failure policy of one size fits all based on the lowest common denominator, in other words no matter how skilled motivated responsible or proud of their work a driver might be, the army of semi cloned managers assumes them all to be at the same level of the most incompetent fool they, those same managers, foolishly recruited and proved to be as anyone with half an ounce of nous could have told them, but instead of training them up to the level of the best if possible they instead do the same thing every time and try to dumb the job down to the level of the incompetent, this only serves to demoralise and demotivate those who take a pride in their job, you can't teach a pig to sing.
Now this wouldn't matter if the managers steeped in logistics management stayed within that sector, but they move on and bring their methods with them.

This policy on large operations of not at least attempting to keep a driver to an allocated vehicle is just one bugbear, some of us look after our vehicles, some others abuse and damage kit spill coffee and leave litter and wouldn't dream of washing the vehicle or cleaning the inside, operators who do this find their better drivers will leave when they get an equivalent offer but are allocated a vehicle to themselves though sensibly its used by others when they are not on shift which is fair enough...now that might seem a small thing to many but if you are a driver who takes a pride there is nothing more demoralising than being handed a battered scratched uncared for stinking heap (that might only be 6 months old but looks 6 years) and being expected to go out and do your level best, the companies who allocate vehicles tend to be better employers in many ways not just this.

As Conor, above, the good employers in the industry who pay their drivers properly for their skills (in return rightly expect some decent work) and treat them with respect don't seem to have any trouble filling their vacancies.
Sadly, to be fair, there are too many licence holders out there who can't get their heads around they have a good job if they have one, can't look after it and bollocks it up by not giving quality value for money , and before you know where you are another good job has bitten the dust and handed over to the green death or some such.

[GasGas]

Shame there's no 'like' button for the above posts...

[yourhavingalarf]

Spot on...

From Juddian, I couldn't agree more.

The way full timers are treated when I've been tipping at Eddies (just one of the culprits) is embarrassing. Spoken to like dirt and then allocated a truck that I wouldn't go near for a 15 hour shift (if you get back at all despite only asking for a dayshift).

Yes, it is the same old story. Ever since 'logistics' became the buzz-word, the whole thing slid off a cliff.

[cav551]

I think the full text of two points of the lady's submission to the oxygen wasters warrants recognition, I get the impression that she is just as exasperated as we all are with the attitude of the industry: she said:

" I think many potential drivers don’t really get started.They turn up as an inexperienced agency driver to a client’s traffic office, where sometimes (...only sometimes. Before you howl, I do know there are plenty of good companies where this is not the case) they are treated with lack of respect by the person behind the window, by other drivers in the yard and then at the client premises they are delivering to. And that may be after they’ve already had the start time of their assignment changed from something they agreed to something else that suits a lot less, mucking up all sorts of elements of their family and social life. Then they have to use a layby. They realise that not only are they not King of the Road, but they’renever going to be."

AND

"Specifically, I believe that a reduction to the driver’s working day should be considered.

The driver’s day has gradually been lengthened through a number of EU related changes:

1968: Transport Act of 1968 - restricted the driver's working day to 12.5 hours through what was referred to as ‘spreadover’, ensuring 11.5 hours off-duty.
1986: Amendments abolished the 1968 limits on driver duty when a driver was covered by EC rules - the new provisions on rest periods within the EC rules effectively limited the hours for which a driver could be on duty and any reduction in daily rest from 11 to 9 hours had to be made up by the end of the following week
2005: the Working Time Directive was applied to the road transport industry, with a very weak interpretation of PoAs (Periods of Availability) adopted in the UK
2007: EC regulation 561/2006 meant no rest compensation was required - from 2007, there has been no requirement to make up any reduction in daily rest, so there is no compensation required following a 9 hour overnight break

That change in April 2007 means that each and every week can include three 15 hour days. And after those 15 hour days, the driver needs to travel home, eat, sleep for a few hours, get up, shower, travel and report back to work.

A UK driver's life often consists of much hanging around for one reason and another, and the Working Time Directive doesn’t really do anything to help - the weak interpretation of PoAs was accompanied by a casual approach to its application, in many ways turning what should have been protective legislation into just another administrative task.

Could a return to the past be helpful? Would limiting the length of the working day back to the 12.5 hour spreadover help to make the job more attractive? Should the Working Time Directive for mobile workers be abolished to cut red tape or should PoAs be beefed up to provide drivers with more protection? Certainly pay would need to reflect any change, as drivers will still have the same cost of living and current disincentives already create the illusion of a driver shortage."

[Harry Monk]

The trouble is that as we've seen on this forum so many times, any suggestion that working hours be reduced is met with howls of anguish from other truck drivers who are convinced that long hours on a low hourly rate is the only way to earn a reasonable wage.

[GasGas]

My take is that unless hours become 'family friendly' or wages double, recruiting and retaining drivers is going to be a constant struggle for employers.
Most builders I talk to work 'family-friendly' hours: they either start late or finish early so they can do a school run.
The bleak reality is that you now need 2 adult incomes to run a house and raise a family (or no income at all, and live hand-to-mouth off the state).
With the long hours worked by most drivers, it's impossible for the driver's partner to have a full-time job AND look after the children.
There are two solutions for employers: one is to pay drivers £50,000 a year, the other is to take a leaf out of the building trade book and offer 'family-friendly' hours.
The former solution would entail putting up prices, and the latter using all those wonderful telematics tools to actually run an efficient, well-planned operation, rather then agonising about why driver A idled his lorry for two minutes before leaving the yard last Tuesday morning.
There's the challenge...

[Mick Bracewell]

The trouble is that as we've seen on this forum so many times, any suggestion that working hours be reduced is met with howls of anguish from other truck drivers who are convinced that long hours on a low hourly rate is the only way to earn a reasonable wage.

Yep. And it's the majority, not the minority. Just try to find any piece of 60ft long tarmac on a night without a truck parked on it with its driver 'living the dream' in his tin box with no wash or toilet facilities, having his 9 hours off before cracking on with another 15 hour shift all for £600 take home.

As Conor notes, the establishments who offer decent terms and decent equipment have no issues with recruitment and retention. It's always the logistics companies crying about driver shortages, whilst completely ignoring the simple fix to their woes which is staring them right in the face. Bring it on I say. The country would be a far better place without the likes of Stobart, Wincanton and all the other 'race-to-the-bottom' logistics companies.

[Winseer]

A tiered and rigidly enforced minimum wage is the answer....

Those lines of employment that often involve working hours/shifts beyond "ten per shift", especially across Midnight - should attract a higher base minimum wage than being the bod who says "Computa sez nah" at some 9-5 desk job somewhere....

This would also get around the loophole where the payment of a premium for "overtime" is considered entirely optional by firms, again - not just hauliers...

[Franglais]

A tiered and rigidly enforced minimum wage is the answer....

The sort of scheme favoured by left of centre parties, but disliked by Tories, and free marketeers?
The sort of scheme that needs some centralization of pay rates to avoid undercutting and a race to the bottom?

Good to see you recognise that the Tories, Farage, and free market carpet-baggers and those who profit from Brexit are against British workers.
Welcome to the real world Mr Winseer.

[Mazzer2]

A tiered and rigidly enforced minimum wage is the answer....

The sort of scheme favoured by left of centre parties, but disliked by Tories, and free marketeers?
The sort of scheme that needs some centralization of pay rates to avoid undercutting and a race to the bottom?

Good to see you recognise that the Tories, Farage, and free market carpet-baggers and those who profit from Brexit are against British workers.
Welcome to the real world Mr Winseer.

Well the minimum wage was brought in a by a left of centre yet they didn't see fit to bring in that system

[Conor]

"Would limiting the length of the working day back to the 12.5 hour spreadover help to make the job more attractive? "

No. Not even close. Your average millennial balks at the thought of a 40hr working week, they're sure as hell not going to want to do anywhere near a 12hr shift.

Personally I think over the next year or two the problem is going to solve itself. Come the end of next month the days of plentiful eastern europeans queuing up in their 10,000s to come here every year willing to work for peanuts, not just in lorry driving but in factory and warehouse work comes to an end. Lorry driver is never going to get Tier 2 status, DVLA have said multiple times that there's plenty with licences to meet demand. So the lorry drivers who are already here on the stroke of midnight is the labour pool and it's one that's shrinking by thousands a year as people leave for greener pastures or just simply retire. The promise of a 15hr shift and automated vehicles in the next decade is going to put off many from coming into the job.

The savvy companies will work this out if they haven't already and start improving terms - I remember being at Geopost, now DPD, when wage negotiations were ongoing as the WTD was coming in, PoA hadn't yet been announced and the negotiations were looking at 25% wage rises to try to retain drivers by paying them the same for 4 days as they were getting for five. The far less savvy ones won't until they can't find anyone who'll work for them, they phone the agency and say what they're willing to pay and the agencies laugh down the phone at them before hanging up. Sure there'll be the odd few who manage to find drivers who'll work for peanuts but their wagons will be driven by people with DR10s and the like on their licences, the unemployable anywhere else.

[Winseer]

A tiered and rigidly enforced minimum wage is the answer....

The sort of scheme favoured by left of centre parties, but disliked by Tories, and free marketeers?
The sort of scheme that needs some centralization of pay rates to avoid undercutting and a race to the bottom?

Good to see you recognise that the Tories, Farage, and free market carpet-baggers and those who profit from Brexit are against British workers.
Welcome to the real world Mr Winseer.

We've yet to see a truly "Capitalist System" implemented in this country, one that involves national interest over international interest.

Brexit - was a way for the average UK worker to block foreigners coming here to flood into positions that *without* them - would see rapidly rising pay rates, simply due to TRUE supply and demand being allowed to produce true price-discovery in the labour market and rates.

I rather fancied the idea of Post-Brexit Britain being along the lines of the "Guilds" system of long ago.
"If you have a rare skill - you are more highly paid for it".

We already got there with say, Plumbers, Vets, Doctors, and other specialist, if arguably merely semi-skilled like we Truckers could be considered to be...

But being members of the EU permitted us to import these specialities from *there* instead of from within our internal jobs market, and within a short space - wages in those fields have stagnated.

My local Plumber is Polish, my local Vet is Italian, My fellow drivers are either older than I am "Brits", or younger Eastern Europeans, and my GP is Indian, making *him* at least rather more "British" than the others, complete with Oxford Accent and all.

If you pemit "regions" of the UK to take the piss when it comes to pushing down wages, terms, and conditions, such as the very low pay rates in Scotland or very poor driver T&Cs in the Costal South East for instance - then the true upside to "Minimum wage" cannot ever be realized, of course.

I'm not in favour of "regional" minimium wage levels, but favour instead "factional" minimum wages, according to profession.
If you are a Doctor, you should expect to be paid more money, because it took you rather more years to acquire your discipline.
Even if you are merely a "Steering wheel attendent" as some one here have described Truckers as - You had to pass a test at the end of a two week course costing well into Four figures - with no guarantee of a "Pass" let alone a "job" at the end of it!
Shouldn't our profession therefore be treated a bit better than a "Builder's Labourer" or "Road Sweeper" or "Hospital Orderly"?

What use is a Unionized workforce IF the pay for "Members" is already rock-bottom, so the only thing the Unions can ever protect is the "job itself" rather than T&Cs?

Once one is down to minimum wage, the "race to the bottom" - ENDS. Unions should work along improving T&Cs rather than trying to prevent wages dropping even lower, which legally they won't be, of course...

Protecting a Minimum waged job? Stuff it! If the pay is that poor, it presumably means there are enough "fish in the sea" that you can routinely let people go at the drop of a hat, and replace them with someone else who can't even speak our lingo, and may have only just got here, or at least "is obliged to take the job, or be benefit sanctioned"....

Higher-paid work - comes with a risk - it is true.
Agency work, already carrying the highest risk of "instant dismissal" at any time - should therefore carry the highest premiums over what a full timer would get...
But they DON'T anymore - do they?

If you're lucky, you'll be paid parity pay on agency where the full timer's wage happens to be GOOD like at Royal Mail, but where drivers are already on less than a tenner per hour, the agencies supplying that firm - won't be paying agency much MORE than that - will they?

Brexit has taken so long now - that the rot that has been the past four decades, pretty much since we joined the EEC in 1974-5 - is almost a permanent part of our psyche as a workforce...
Gone are the days when you could "Get ahead financially" by working hard, putting in more hours, getting extra training, taking a dead-man's-shoes job eventually...

Maybe that was the establishment's master plan all along? "Make it take so long to implement, that the Brexit Dividend indeed never materializes, at least not in our lifetimes...
Instead, the Establishment that so loathed to spend money on Brexit, so loathe to close our borders sooner, and so loath to lock down people that shouldn't be on the streets in the FIRST place - have now showered all the wrong groups with the "compensation" for Covid, rather than those who already lose their jobs. This isn't *me* btw, as I'm fortunate enough to have got another job, as soon as I realized I'd been "let go" without being told... The REAL trouble starts - the moment Sunak's handouts come to a stop, as they surely must before long, whilst our debt rises to such an outrageous level, that we risk having that debt called in by the very nation in the world that we should all be resisting right now - China.

Doya think Chinese "Workers Paradise" brand of Communism is for YOU?
Fancy having a poorly paid, and dangerous job in China then?



What do you think happens to a Western country over a trillion indebted to China - once that debt gets called in?

If Trump is now gone, you can kiss goodbye to any notion of "Debt Walkaway", which at least Trump was expert enough at to offer the other western nation's a possible way out, once the ultiamte debt collector comes a-calling...

British Lefties - won't be so happy when their next beloved Labour government spends-a-plenty as they've done before, BUT with the new caveat that "more of your life must be under oppression, forever"..
A routine that has argumable already started in what is known as the "Great Reset"...

I'm frankly sickened by Boris Johnson's apparent shift to the Left and simpering to Biden, who isn't even President yet.
Less than a year from winning a decent majority, and he throws it all away on THIS behaviour...
Did someone stick a pod next to him when he was in Hospital recovering from "Covid"?


We're going to need a radical government to get us out of the complete schtuck we're in.
A future of six-way parliamentary splits though?
How do we ever get anything done again???

Even Macron has shifted to the Right now, realizing that he needs to for both his own political survival AND his wider country.

Who's the bastion of Britishness among our actual MPs these days?
..It ain't Boris and the Tories, it seems...
Meanwhile, we don't even hear from Keir Starmer any more "reasons to re-join the EU"...
The Libdems have been silent, and the SNP don't talk much, once "IndyRef2" and "Covid" are not to be talked about....

[Winseer]

Perhaps a weekly working limit for Drivers of either a four shift week OR limiting the number of shifts worked to a maximum of four, OR preventing any job working over 48 hours over any number of shifts... Now funny thing with this latter one, - it seems a bit daft that a full timer gets their hours "capped", but an agency bod can work more than 10 hours on nights, can work 5 or 6 shifts over 12 hours per week, and an agency can have well over an hour per shift knocked off for "Meal Breaks"....

FORGET "Wages" - Assume the "race to the bottom" will be WON in due course by the firms, with all of us getting near minimum wages in the end... Concentrate on making *your* job "better than Dante's 9th Level of Hell" at very least....

A low paid job that is good is better than a low paid job that is bad.

[Franglais]

We've yet to see a truly "Capitalist System" implemented in this country, one that involves national interest over international insterest.

Where? When? How? Is capitalism anything other than a means for private individuals to enrich themselves? Nothing to do with the national interest. Never was, never will be.
Nonsense.

Brexit - was a way for the average UK worker to block foreigners coming here to flood into positions that *without* them - would see rapidly rising pay rates, simply due to TRUE supply and demand being allowed to produce true price-discovery in the labour market and rates.

Where? When? How? Was Brexit about stopping foreigners undercutting UK workers? It is all about dropping standards and being "more competitive"; dropping "red tape", such as unemployment and social expenses for employers; opening borders to even cheaper products, so cutting national standards. Go and read what was said, not what you imagined or wanted to be said.
Look at the the only economist who Leave could get to speak up for them: Prof Minford.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/busi ... 91271.html
Or better this
https://www.forbes.com/sites/carltonrei ... b713cb5c4b
Even Minford, much admired by Brexiteers says car manufacturing and farming would go the same way as steel and coal etc in the UK....down the pan. But never fear "the country" would be better off.....look good to you? Looks pretty bad to me.
Gove thinks EU workers are expensive anyway. Post Brexit just get cheaper ones from, the Ukraine maybe.
https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/brexit ... gove-28372

I rather fancied the idea of Post-Brexit Britain being along the lines of the "Guilds" system of long ago.
"If you have a rare skill - you are more highly paid for it".

Which bus was that written on?
Don`t bother, the old saying "it ain`t worth the paper it`s written on" took on a new meaning in 2016....

[Winseer]

Since the very start of this, Brexiteers including myself - could have been talked OUT of it, had we 52% been compensated enough in the meantime.

The daft paradox with regards to THAT though,

"Had the government offered significant grants/tax cuts/pay hikes to JUST those "who voted Leave" in the referendum that, let's face it - ALL poltiicians think "should never have been held"...

....We'd suddenly have "everyone and his dog" become a Brexiteer, who voted leave (you can't prove someone didn't...) - lining up for the Brexit Voter's "soft landing" package of a higher tax free allowance at very least.... The "resistance" to Brexit - would disappear on the spot, now Remainers see great reasons to lie about how they voted, and pretend to have been Brexiteers all along - to get the "breaks"...

No one bothered to TRY and "compensate" the Brexit voter though - Did they?

All we got was "YOU made the mistake, WE will now make a grand mess, which we'll later blame on you, or something else that cannot be fixed *because* Brexit won't LET us fix it".

Covid? - Stays in line to be the excuse that can STILL yet cancel Brexit before the end of the year.

The only Brexit we are getting from January 1st, is a crappy deal, or No Deal. What we *won't* be getting is a GOOD deal, because it was simply never on offer by either side.

Britain - is to be made an example of, since we couldn't be talked out of it, and we couldn't be talked out of it, because our supposedly Brexiteer Prime Minister has shifted to placate this country's Left at a time the Right are Right royally shafted on BOTH side of the Atlantic now.

...This is a recepie to completely knacker the next general election, which just happens to be in the same year as the next US election now.

Who replaces Boris Johnson's Conservatives? Who's replacing Trump, either January next year, or by the latest January 2025?
Even in France, Marine Le Penn must be considering Early Retirement by this point, Macron has shot so far Right of her - she's now surely redundant??

It doesn't matter "who believes what" any longer.
What matters now - is who survives the tribulation ahead....
The Country failed to "pull up the drawbridge", so it is now down to individuals to attempt the same at a more personal level.

[Rjan]

"Would limiting the length of the working day back to the 12.5 hour spreadover help to make the job more attractive? "

No. Not even close. Your average millennial balks at the thought of a 40hr working week, they're sure as hell not going to want to do anywhere near a 12hr shift.

I think the difference is that women are more likely to work full-time these days, and are thus more likely to expect men to participate in keeping the house and child-rearing, as well as relaxing together in the evenings, which is impossible to square with such long working hours.

There is also a weaker social culture in the workplace and on the road, which supports long hours of attendance at work.

As for youth balking at a 40hr working week, what are the pay and conditions on offer for it? Or does this just peddle the same propaganda of employers, who complain they can't get slaves for 40 hours of night work, in exchange for a minimum wage that doesn't even pay the rent? Similar to how they complain they can't get drivers?

[Winseer]

Isn't it time we started looking at work from a "quality of life" aspect, rather than merely earning enough to pay bills, the old "Work to live, and ending up Living to Work" adage?

...If you need to work 45 hours per week for a comfortable paid-for lifestyle, then it'll be sensible to take a job where the hourly rate is sufficient - and also give attention to the aspects like "making this job over three shifts" rather than *six*.

It is high time we reduced road traffic back to April 2020's levels - Permanently, but without having another lockdown to achieve it.
This would satisify the green Lobby as well, of course....

"Is your journey really necessary?"


...Your COMMUTING Journey..!

[SHYTOT]

If you want a 24/7 society people have to work 24/7
can you imagine everywhere closed on a Sunday other than churches & hospitals
stop all the production lines stop everything, people will soon get bored
lets try it

[GasGas]

If you want a 24/7 society people have to work 24/7
can you imagine everywhere closed on a Sunday other than churches & hospitals
stop all the production lines stop everything, people will soon get bored
lets try it

I think we more or less have...this year.

I'm old enough to remember getting by without the supermarkets opening on Sundays...it was tough, but we managed, and supported loads of corner shops/newsagents in the process.
I used to be involved with a well-known motor museum...they experienced a downturn in Sunday visitors when the local big shopping centre opened on Sundays and the figures never recovered.
A mate of mine worked in Currys...he said a lot of families used to come in on a Sunday for 'something to do' even if the weather was lovely. And that was in a branch on the edge of the Cotswolds with lovely walks and tourist attractions all around.

[msgyorkie]

If you want a 24/7 society people have to work 24/7
can you imagine everywhere closed on a Sunday other than churches & hospitals
stop all the production lines stop everything, people will soon get bored
lets try it

I would love to see a return to Sunday closing. Make it a day of rest and leisure.

[Winseer]

If you want a 24/7 society people have to work 24/7
can you imagine everywhere closed on a Sunday other than churches & hospitals
stop all the production lines stop everything, people will soon get bored
lets try it

This lockdown, would have broken the 24/7 regime, except so many are ignoring it, that traffic is as bad as ever.

[robroy]

So after years of hearing about the 'driver shortage' bollocks, we're now being told what the non gullible amongst us already knew.......There ain't a one!
No [zb] Sherlock eh?

That woman's take on it is absolutely accurate,.and good on her for pointing out the facts.

Who tf in their right mind wants to take up a job with everything she points out, ridiculously long hours for same rate right through , and all the rest of it, working for [zb] who think nothing of you, and for the majority who treat you like school kids with their modern management policies...such as cameras for a start.

As said it will never improve for as long as we have the 80 hour glory boys who relish it
In actual fact it's those lot who exacerbate it.

Then we have the ones who see it as 'Just normal' without really thinking it through.....
.'That's the nature of the job/always been that way/you're in the wrong job' cretins, .......
Well as I've always said on here, no it isn't, but that is the way it has evolved (or eroded) from the 12.5 hour spreadovers we once worked at....as that lady points out, proving my point.

Then there's the rest of us, who know the job has turned into a crock of [zb], but still put the hours in as it HAS actually became 'The done thing' (ok, I saw the light and cut my hours, but that's another story)

So I for one am pleased it has finally been recognised by some official body or other how bad this job has become.
Excellent news imo, so hope it's a green shoot to sort out the crap.

So maybe in years to come (and when I'm well out of it ) through time when the 3 categories of drivers mentioned have moved on, ..ie. The idiots, The apathetic pacifists, and The reluctant realists, something will HAVE to be done to make this job once more attractive, as it was when I started it, by pulling it in to 21st Century t.s and c.s.instead of 19th century ''kids working down 't pit '' style.

Btw I do get why some are going for long hours, those in hock, maintenance of lifestyle and all the rest of it, ....but not forgetting the fortunate minority who do it willingly as they know they are being adequately compensated for it through their excellent t.s and c.s, mainly Union firms
So maybe there is part of your answer (whether it fits in with your anti union agenda or not) ''If we all stuck together'' yawn [zb] yawn
Hell,.even I would be back putting in the hours again if I worked for a good firm, .....but not for 10 quid right through ffs.

[Londontrucker123]

Sorry, couldn't even bear the read the whole thread.

This crap gets more recycled than my rubbish.

[Winseer]

There is a shortage of well-paid driver jobs.
There is an abundance of low-paid driver jobs.

There won't be a shortage of "drivers" - until and unless every COMBINED job vacancy across the two groups above - gets filled in due course.

Who will feel the pinch first?

I would suggest that those firms who would rather employ a "six-points OK" driver who "doesn't argue the toss" rather than a clean-licenced driver who'll always push back when wronged - might struggle to keep their internal overheads down, Eg. fixing numerous vehicles and property smashed up by the less experienced driver, who was "only doing what they were told, to the letter" all the time.
How much money did "firm's policy" lose from THIS little incident for instance?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-47001308

Sunak in his Spring Budget - might decide to raise taxes *indirectly* rather than just lump extra income tax and national insurance contributions onto the masses...
ONE such way of "raising indirect taxes" - would be to reduce or abolish completely the way a firm can claim things like "damage to property" against tax...?

I've already spoken at length in the past, meanwhile - that INSURERS too - might one day decide "not to cover that firm who go out of their way to employ sub-standard drivers" that smash stuff up...

Now all that remains - is to see how many people can be shifted into 55-84 hour week jobs at or near minimum wage, should the day come soon when "at or near minimum wage" happens to be all that's left out there.

[Juddian]

There is a shortage of well-paid driver jobs.
There is an abundance of low-paid driver jobs.


[/i]

There is also a shortage of competent drivers prepared to look after those remaining well paid jobs, ie not take the piss out of the sick scheme nor look after the kit or bother about looking after the customer or indeed the employer themselves by going the extra mile when the job demands it.

There are good drivers in good jobs still, they tend to keep schtum because they wouldn't want some of the dross that would turn up if the job was broadcast, that's why sop many of the better job vacancies are filled by recommendation...and before anyone complains about that quoting old pals act, the OPA isn't always the case, those in good jobs would be fools indeed to recommend a chump who in turn would put other chumps up = job goes tits up and hey presto here come the green death or some other equivalent.

[Wheel Nut]

I have read on these forums that someone gets offered a place, they go to an assessment or to a days work experience where they will shadow another driver. It appears that they will do that with no recompense.

I just did some paperwork for my son in law where he went for a days work experience in a care home, they were pestering him because he hadn't sent them his bank details. Today a cheque dropped through the post, he was paid over £100 for turning up for 1 day. and he got his breakfast and dinner paid for!

[GasGas]

I have read on these forums that someone gets offered a place, they go to an assessment or to a days work experience where they will shadow another driver. It appears that they will do that with no recompense.

I just did some paperwork for my son in law where he went for a days work experience in a care home, they were pestering him because he hadn't sent them his bank details. Today a cheque dropped through the post, he was paid over £100 for turning up for 1 day. and he got his breakfast and dinner paid for!

there's a shortage ;of care home workers...so they are now being well-treated (wasn't always the case).