Happy Keith:
Carryfast:
‘…bring it on let’s see who wins out…’Tut-tut - now you know that we’re not allowed to unless Brussels gives it the nod first …remember who’s country it is.
Yeah right and we all know which European ‘state’ would raise the biggest objection. 
Mike-C:
Harry Monk:
See Mike, here’s a case in point, as you’ll know.Back in the 1960’s, everything came in through Liverpool. Then, suddenly, trade moved eastwards, we imported less from the USA and more from Europe. Dover was born, and Liverpool died.
I live in a seaside town which died almost overnight when package holidays to Spain were invented.
It’s just the way it is. It’s sad that I can’t do a run to Istanbul any more, but I understand the reasons for it.
You’re sort of right. Although most fruit and produce imported did come through here at one time, cypress spuds and tomatoes from spain etc…They now come direct by reefer and foreign driver from where they’re grown mainly
Great so at least there’s still jobs for a long distance truck drivers.It’s just that most of the brits don’t seem to want to drive any more?.
Carryfast:
muckles:
Carryfast:
Harry Monk:
Completely agree with newmercman. If it is more efficient for goods to be transported in bulk by rail, then that’s how it should be done, regardless of any self-interest we may have.The whole point of containerisation has always been to move goods in bulk as much as possible and to reduce one-man-operation movements to a minimum. Were it any other way, we would all be driving overland to China to collect all that tat
So how were they running freight economically to Asia and the Middle East by road from here in the 1970’s and early 1980’s? and if it was’nt for the high road fuel taxes and transit taxes etc etc we still could.Given the right roads and big enough trucks and the same fuel prices as rail pays yes overland to China why not?.
The boom on Europe to Middle East freight in the 70’s was for 2 reasons, the ports in the area couldn’t cope with the sudden economic expansion so ships would wait weeks to be unloaded and also the Suez Canal was closed for many years in the 70’s due to Arab Israeli conflicts this meant ships from Europe had to go all the way round Africa adding weeks to the journey. This meant that high prices could be charged for freight to be shipped by road.
If what we hear on here from those still running there the rate still works out at twice as much per mile as you’d get to run on European work.It’s just that like all other types of road transport the overheads have gone through the roof because of fuel costs etc.which of course is government policy to artificially make road less competitive than rail transport.It’s just that in the case of M/E work it’s the container ships which pick up the benefit not rail.But a container ship still does’nt stand a chance when it comes to to the time factor in getting freight to M/E from Europe.
The rates will be higher because the work is more difficult and it will be specialist, or rush jobs which get a premium price.
I doubt there are so many overheads for those running from the Middle East and with cheap labour from India working out in those regions why isn’t there a que of trucks bringing containers from the Gulf to the ports in Syria, The Lebanon or even Eygpt to then ship them onto boats for Europe?
Carryfast:
Really so all of those freight trains running through the channel tunnel and trains running containers from the continental ports throughout Europe must just be an illusion.And you can still have a decent home life and do long distance work if you employ enough drivers to work decent rotas or if you can afford to earn enough doing less runs…
How many freight trains a day run through the tunnel compared to all the trucks at all the UK ports to Europe?
This might help put it into perpective.
http://www3.eurotunnel.com/ukcP3Main/ukcCorporate/ukcTheGroup/ukcOperations/ukpTraffic
2008 over 14 million tonnes of road freight through the tunnel compared to 1.2million tonnes of rail freight, then add to that the road freight going through Dover, Portmouth etc.
What proportion of those trucks are British operated or have British drivers?
Do you know what percentage of Europes freight is moved by rail and what is moved by road?
muckles:
Carryfast:
muckles:
Carryfast:
Harry Monk:
Completely agree with newmercman. If it is more efficient for goods to be transported in bulk by rail, then that’s how it should be done, regardless of any self-interest we may have.The whole point of containerisation has always been to move goods in bulk as much as possible and to reduce one-man-operation movements to a minimum. Were it any other way, we would all be driving overland to China to collect all that tat
So how were they running freight economically to Asia and the Middle East by road from here in the 1970’s and early 1980’s? and if it was’nt for the high road fuel taxes and transit taxes etc etc we still could.Given the right roads and big enough trucks and the same fuel prices as rail pays yes overland to China why not?.
The boom on Europe to Middle East freight in the 70’s was for 2 reasons, the ports in the area couldn’t cope with the sudden economic expansion so ships would wait weeks to be unloaded and also the Suez Canal was closed for many years in the 70’s due to Arab Israeli conflicts this meant ships from Europe had to go all the way round Africa adding weeks to the journey. This meant that high prices could be charged for freight to be shipped by road.
If what we hear on here from those still running there the rate still works out at twice as much per mile as you’d get to run on European work.It’s just that like all other types of road transport the overheads have gone through the roof because of fuel costs etc.which of course is government policy to artificially make road less competitive than rail transport.It’s just that in the case of M/E work it’s the container ships which pick up the benefit not rail.But a container ship still does’nt stand a chance when it comes to to the time factor in getting freight to M/E from Europe.
The rates will be higher because the work is more difficult and it will be specialist, or rush jobs which get a premium price.
I doubt there are so many overheads for those running from the Middle East and with cheap labour from India working out in those regions why isn’t there a que of trucks bringing containers from the Gulf to the ports in Syria, The Lebanon or even Eygpt to then ship them onto boats for Europe?Carryfast:
Really so all of those freight trains running through the channel tunnel and trains running containers from the continental ports throughout Europe must just be an illusion.And you can still have a decent home life and do long distance work if you employ enough drivers to work decent rotas or if you can afford to earn enough doing less runs…How many freight trains a day run through the tunnel compared to all the trucks at all the UK ports to Europe?
This might help put it into perpective.
http://www3.eurotunnel.com/ukcP3Main/ukcCorporate/ukcTheGroup/ukcOperations/ukpTraffic
2008 over 14 million tonnes of road freight through the tunnel compared to 1.2million tonnes of rail freight, then add to that the road freight going through Dover, Portmouth etc.
What proportion of those trucks are British operated or have British drivers?
Do you know what percentage of Europes freight is moved by rail and what is moved by road?
But the reason that British trucks are’nt hauling their share of the mainland europe-UK work is because too many of the british hauliers and drivers prefer to stay at home doing local/uk work instead of competing for the european work.We are less competitive because we keep allowing the government to unfairly tax and regulate the british road transport fleet in order to allow rail freight to try to take the work instead.While all the brits do is complain about foreign road transport picking up the advantage and support the rail industry’s attempts to put the British and Continental long distance road transport industry out of work.It would be a good start to try to take some of that 1.2 million tonnes off the rail industry and also some of the rail freight which runs on the european mainland and within the uk and then when the British road transport industry gets a bit stronger try to get a better share of that 14 million tonnes +.But we won’t do it by sitting watching the foreign trucks doing the work and complaining and trying to put more work off the road transport industry by giving it to rail.
Carryfast,
I think the two things are totally unrelated, rail freight in the UK mainly hauls low value commodies such as aggregates or containers, neither of which go to the continent, I’ve already explained at length my opinion on railfreight so no need to repeat that.
The reasons the UK haulier is no longer a major player in Europe are simple, 1, we don’t make anything that needs exporting anymore so we have little control over who brings our imports in & 2, the unfair taxes that we have to pay in our supposedly common market, add to that the extra costs that living & operating a business in the UK incur & you can see that we have no chance at being competitive. I would estimate that at todays prices you would need at least 1.30 per mile + tolls to actually be able to run a decent motor, pay a decent wage & make a profit out of a 2500mile trip to Europe, try quoting that rate to a freight forwarder 
newmercman:
Carryfast,I think the two things are totally unrelated, rail freight in the UK mainly hauls low value commodies such as aggregates or containers, neither of which go to the continent, I’ve already explained at length my opinion on railfreight so no need to repeat that.
The reasons the UK haulier is no longer a major player in Europe are simple, 1, we don’t make anything that needs exporting anymore so we have little control over who brings our imports in & 2, the unfair taxes that we have to pay in our supposedly common market, add to that the extra costs that living & operating a business in the UK incur & you can see that we have no chance at being competitive. I would estimate that at todays prices you would need at least 1.30 per mile + tolls to actually be able to run a decent motor, pay a decent wage & make a profit out of a 2500mile trip to Europe, try quoting that rate to a freight forwarder
No but around £1 per mile is a rate which I’ve been given by more than one freight forwarder in the past when enquiring about subbie work.If you’re working as an owner driver it’s just the wage which you need and forget the profit on top.There was someone on here who heard that the east europeans who are doing most of the uk-continent work are earning around £200 per week take home which would be a lot more than I’m earning in early retirement or an unemployed driver will get on the dole and it’s around what I was getting as an employed driver on 50 hours per week + uk night work driving an artic.But if the reason was because we don’t make anything anymore or trade with europe then those east european wagons would be running back and forwards with a load of fresh air on their wagons.It’s a simple case of collect the imports and deliver as much as you can of the exports instead of just watching the foreign wagons do all the work and complaining about it.The fact is we’ve always imported more into the country than we’ve ever exported and the British road transport industry is making exactly the same mistakes now as the British merchant navy fleet did years ago.
Carryfast:
If you’re working as an owner driver it’s just the wage which you need and forget the profit on top.quote]For your sake I’m glad you never had enough start up capital to become an owner operator, profit is the most important thing any business needs, if you run around for a pound a mile & pay all your bills, that will just about leave you with enough as wages to get by on, assuming you do 2000 miles a week, now how do you maintain your motor, put tyres on it, replace it? What happens if you don’t have any work for two weeks? Or get stuck in a strike in Calais, all of a sudden you’re running at a loss & if you don’t make any profit normally, how are you ever going to make that up?
Any successful owner operator stops being a lorry driver on day one, or very soon after, they become businessmen who drive lorries. An owner operator can run at a lower rate & make a profit, but only by keeping the costs down, the way you keep your costs down is by doing a lot of the stuff yourself that a larger company would pay employees to do, admin, accounts, maintainance etc etc, you don’t have to have a big yard & an office so you don’t have all the bills associated with that, but then we get to the real issue, an owner operators lorry is still taking the same stuff down the same road as a larger company, why should they charge any less? Surely the way to do it is to charge the same rate, but offer a better, more reliable service
newmercman:
Carryfast:
If you’re working as an owner driver it’s just the wage which you need and forget the profit on top.quote]For your sake I’m glad you never had enough start up capital to become an owner operator, profit is the most important thing any business needs, if you run around for a pound a mile & pay all your bills, that will just about leave you with enough as wages to get by on, assuming you do 2000 miles a week, now how do you maintain your motor, put tyres on it, replace it? What happens if you don’t have any work for two weeks? Or get stuck in a strike in Calais, all of a sudden you’re running at a loss & if you don’t make any profit normally, how are you ever going to make that up?
Any successful owner operator stops being a lorry driver on day one, or very soon after, they become businessmen who drive lorries. An owner operator can run at a lower rate & make a profit, but only by keeping the costs down, the way you keep your costs down is by doing a lot of the stuff yourself that a larger company would pay employees to do, admin, accounts, maintainance etc etc, you don’t have to have a big yard & an office so you don’t have all the bills associated with that, but then we get to the real issue, an owner operators lorry is still taking the same stuff down the same road as a larger company, why should they charge any less? Surely the way to do it is to charge the same rate, but offer a better, more reliable service
But that is how tough the conditions are in the current economic climate here now that we’ve opened up the western european economies to the eastern european ex commie bloc lot.They’re running under those rates so it’s a case of join them or shut up shop and sit at home earning nothing instead of not as much we’d like to.But profit and loss accounting just has to go out the window in that case.Out of that £1 per mile would have to come ‘all’ of the operating costs of the wagon.What’s left is wages.If those wages are better than the dole then that’s as much as you’re in the job for.A subbie is’nt taking the ‘same stuff’ down the road as a big company which is why the subbie gets the job while the employed class 1 driver on the big firm earns either an unsustainable wage and usually finds himself in a case of earning £500 per week for a year or two and then finds himself on the dole or driving a four wheeler on local multi drop (if he’s lucky) earning less than that Polish class 1 driver (or a Brit who’s working for the same money) gets running to Italy and back.But at least that continental job is a better way of making a low wage than that local/uk one is.In this climate we’ve got to offer that better more reliable service at East European rates IF we want the British international road transport industry to survive.But the removal of road fuel taxation would help the balance sheet.But it would be pointless to then use that rebate (IF we could get it) to pay ourselves more wages so those east europeans get another advantage.We live in hard times now but as someone who came through times like these but for different reasons back then (the Britain of 1980 when there were too many of us looking for too few jobs)I’ve been there,seen it,done it,and got the T shirt and I know what it’s like to have the choice of take a job which does’nt pay anywhere near enough or have no job at all and earn even less.If the new generation of drivers think that they’re seeing hard times now they have’nt seen anything yet and it’s my bet that only the class of 1975 like me knows what’s coming.
Carryfast,
I get where you’re coming from, in a world of few jobs you’re more likely to generate income as an owner operator, but in today’s economy running around trying to compete with the flatheads is likely to mean you’ll end up with nothing at the end of the week, for example they’re roundtripping Italy for less than I used to get one way in the late 80s, I used to take full advantage of spurious fuel in those days & did it for a number of years & although I made a decent living out of it I never made fortunes, costs are dramatically higher now in all areas & I can’t see how they’re making any money at all, but that’s the way it is now, the arse has been totally ripped out of the job, the only way to get it back to a reasonable level would be for the government to actually give us the common market that we’re supposed to be a part of, considering we’ve been members since 1973, I can’t see that happening in my lifetime 
Surely we are finally reaping the ‘benefits’ of
newmercman:
‘…the common market that we’re supposed to be a part of…’
but didn’t get any kind of cost vs. risk/benefit analysis presented to us prior to every Crap-jack nation piling-in courtesy of Bliar & his Gravy-train loving predecessors.
The ‘benefits’ consist of ‘diversity’, ie, foreign nations not playing by the rules, them having far cheaper overheads & dodgy practices …which is all too bad for us.
