Then we are in agreement. 
Winseer:
If we had such a policy in this country, the minimum wage would need to be NATIONAL, so we donât end up encouraging the north to move south. Better the other way surely, where now itâs possible to get London wages in say, Newcastle - Many of us would actually be encouraged to move oop narth, where there are still pubs, the women like â â â , and thereâs a lot more open space.
No you donât want to move up here, itâs terrible. Always raining, freezing cold, minimum wage driving jobs, if you can get one that is. Youâre much better off staying down there keeping the new arrivals company.
Exactly. Iâd love to move up north - the disparity of wages alone assures that I never do though. 
âŚMaybe as a retirement location should I ever win the lottery, which in itself is even more unlikely by the fact I hardly ever buy a ticket. 
i have been seeing a lot more signs on the road urgently needed hgv drivers
even the hollies cafe has one that i never noticed before
the company i work for uses many different agenys as not one of them can supply enough drivers and i suspect its the same all over ?
the bad side for me is that if as a result of me not getting my cpc along with others it then has the knock on effect of benefiting all the drivers who ran off to get the card its a bit of a slap in the face as really we should of all stuck together on this issue and took a stance.
so if things do kick off in September fellows and you all end up with a pay rise you can all club together to pay for my cpc card
Desypete drivers do not stick together,so why would others not do there cpc because you never.im not having a dig but this line of work has no loyality or backbone
What would âdrivers sticking togetherâ actually be in 21st century Britain?
Thereâs no all-powerful Union to speak of.
Wages range widely up and down the country for the same jobs already.
Higher wages can only be achieved by preventing those prepared to work for less from working.
This used to be done by âgoing on strikeâ in other industries, but even in the '70s, you didnât get much picketing by truckers going on, unlike in modern France.
The governments here have seen to it that this economy is force-fed cheap labour from abroad to keep wages down.
What is there to stick together over then? - Any driver-led policy would be declared illegal, except under a totally different government type.
WE donât get to decide âYou canât employ that guy boss, or those people guvnor - because they donât hold the right qualifications or have enough experienceâ. To discriminate is to be branded a racist in this day and age.
Thereâs nothing to stop a boss of a small yard refusing to employ anyone except home-grown talent though. The interview process still means a firm can employ anyone they like from a long list of names. Whoâs gonna check that âevery shortlist oddly doesnât contain anyone foreignâ?
Itâs not a question of âDrivers sticking togetherâ therefore - Itâs more one of Employers siding once again with their workforce, instead of pumping the âthem and usâ agenda which has no place in modern Britain. If Unions are dead, so should âThem and usâ beâŚ
desypete:
i have been seeing a lot more signs on the road urgently needed hgv drivers
Did you notice that those signs are all agenciesâŚ? If companies were really short of drivers theyâd advertise themselves directly:!:
If youâre only âbeginningâ to be short of labour as an expanding yard, then it makes more sense to fill the gap initially by taking on someone from an agency, and only taking on a full timer once there is spare capacity to create a job âall year roundâ.
Eg. If Bloggs Haulage requires 1200 man hours per week at itâs quietest, but 1800 hours per week at itâs busiest, then it would make sense for them to have 30 full timers @ 40 hours per week, and get in upto 15 agency drivers as extra cover during the busy times. If that extra 600 hours of slack involves taking on 15 full timers instead, then during the quiet periods, the gaffer might have drivers sweeping the floor, deep cleaning trailers, etc. rather than just sending everyone home early for days at a time.
When Bloggsâs busy period spikes the manhours above DOUBLE what can be covered by the full timers, then it would make sense at that moment to monitor more closely hourage to then recruit new full timers when the âquiet periodsâ still see the weekly arrogate hourage not go anywhere near down to 1200 again.
Thus, full timers get recruited when agencies consistently cannot fill shifts, week after week. Sure, one likes to think that every driver signing up with an agency is depriving someone of a full time job somewhere else, but are they? Agency drivers will be the first ones to be paid more when any driver shortage really starts to bite. Full timers will be the very last to get an increment, unless their yard is well-unionised.
Might be cheaper to recruit full timers, when work drops off then they take it in turns to take the day off paid (because youâre contracted). Iâm sure an agency would cost double & the chance of damage, failed deliveries & costs would increase.
Surely the cost of smashing up a truck is the same for a full timer doing it as for agency? Indeed, it might be cheaper for the yard when hiring via some agencies, since they night carry their own indemnities, insurances, etc. that a full timer would probably have provided by the firm.
Experience wise, any client yard will probably want to see the credentials of any new agency bod sent to them for the first time.
Chances are, youâre going to get less smack-ups from some guy of any age with a clean licence than from even an experienced driver with 9 points for being caught speeding three times⌠That smacks of âcarelessnessâ rather than âidiotâ yâsee⌠How much damage can be put down to the same difference?
Winseer:
Exactly. Iâd love to move up north - the disparity of wages alone assures that I never do though.
:
Ah another one who looks at the top line but doesnât factor in total cost of living.
Thereâs lots of people in London and the South East on double the money I am who are far worse off than I am with far less money to live on after paying the rent/mortgage even though theyâre living in smaller houses.
If youâre earning ÂŁ50,000 a year, paying ÂŁ1500 a month mortgage on a ÂŁ300,000 house youâre going to be worse off than someone earning ÂŁ30,000 paying ÂŁ400 a month mortgage on the same kind of house which only costs ÂŁ100,000.
Cost of living isnât all about âhousesâ on the upside.
Iâve lived in East Riding, where my costs were just as expensive for housing like for like as down here, and the food in shops was just as expensive as down here. Itâs bloody cold and windy during the winter, and the heating bills, despite being higher like-for-like donât seem to keep me as warm because of the constant draughts. I didnât like living near the pylons much either. 
Up there, everything was miles away, and my fuel bills for running my car were astronomical. If I were paid London pay scales, I could have made it work. As it is, being on more provincial pay scales only works for me because I donât have to commute anywhere near as much as I used to. Running a taxi somewhere where the fares are far apart, and youâve often not got a âback fareâ home again doesnât work, because the yorkshire tightwads wonât put their hand in their pockets for the âtwo way tripâ like is expected of passengers down this way. Down here, round trips to airports are extremely lucrative because not only can you command a âback emptyâ fare - you can often actually GET that back fare by kerb-crawling around the Gatwick taxi rank for a few minutes as well⌠Win-Win. Not possible without the airport to drum up that trade though! Itâs just a â â â â â â â that there isnât an airport closer than 55 miles away from where I live. Iâd LOVE the Thames Estuary airport project to have got the go-ahead, but I understand the entire plans are dead in the water now. We could have done with the regeneration around here to be sure. 
Running a driving school would be no better up in Beverley either. Itâs the commute thatâs 90% of the problem oop narth. Everything else can be factored in advance - except where your next fare/lesson fee is coming from. 
windrush:
Silver_Surfer:
Anyone who works Sunday for less than double time unless they are contracted to do it is nuts in my opinion.That can only really work if the customer is prepared to pay double for the goods though, when I was on tippers rate and three quarters was the norm but that was soon cut to rate and a half. Seems to be a shortage around here going by what a long established haulier told me a week or so ago, easier ways of making money without the self expense of training etc I guess? I got all my training for free 38 years ago through my company but I doubt that I would have bothered getting a HGV license if I had needed to fund it myself
Pete.
The extra ÂŁ100 for Sunday running to the driver is a squirt of â â â â to these firms Pete. They just pay as low as they can get away with, supply & demand. You canât really blame them neither. But supposedly now the shoe is back on the other foot.
fredthered:
As an aside, they are voting today in Switzerland for min wage of around ÂŁ15!I donât know how much of their unskilled workforce is foreign but thats a hell of a starting point. Im sure it will attract the migrant worker though.
Yeah but they wonât let them in!
Winseer:
fredthered:
As an aside, they are voting today in Switzerland for min wage of around ÂŁ15!I donât know how much of their unskilled workforce is foreign but thats a hell of a starting point. Im sure it will attract the migrant worker though.
Thatâs easy. Youâre entitlement to such a minimum wage is based on you having a full passport for that country, so you have to have been born there.
I understand that Swiss passports in particular are like Unicornâs Horns to get hold of as it is - before anything like this.If we had such a policy in this country, the minimum wage would need to be NATIONAL, so we donât end up encouraging the north to move south. Better the other way surely, where now itâs possible to get London wages in say, Newcastle - Many of us would actually be encouraged to move oop narth, where there are still pubs, the women like â â â , and thereâs a lot more open space.
London is a different country that isnât too bothered about anywhere north of oxford.
Silver_Surfer:
windrush:
Silver_Surfer:
Anyone who works Sunday for less than double time unless they are contracted to do it is nuts in my opinion.That can only really work if the customer is prepared to pay double for the goods though, when I was on tippers rate and three quarters was the norm but that was soon cut to rate and a half. Seems to be a shortage around here going by what a long established haulier told me a week or so ago, easier ways of making money without the self expense of training etc I guess? I got all my training for free 38 years ago through my company but I doubt that I would have bothered getting a HGV license if I had needed to fund it myself
Pete.
The extra ÂŁ100 for Sunday running to the driver is a squirt of â â â â to these firms Pete. They just pay as low as they can get away with, supply & demand. You canât really blame them neither. But supposedly now the shoe is back on the other foot.
I hope Tesco & Sainsburyâs in particular struggle for drivers after punching the drivers in the face with the abolition of the 8 hour minimum shift at the height of the recession. Drivers know how to hold a grudge, well I do anyway.
" I hope Tesco & Sainsburyâs in particular struggle for drivers after punching the drivers in the face with the abolition of the 8 hour minimum shift at the height of the recession. Drivers know how to hold a grudge, well I do anyway. "
On this one I found it quite easy to deal with as did a few of the other drivers working out of the same depots at the time and the solution was no thanks I go to work to earn money and I wonât got to work for less than 8 hrs pay per day, JS and the agency backed down before the fortnight was out.
The shortage of drivers !!! or the more like the less diss earning drivers amongst us who wonât allow agencies or employers to take the mick are making good money.
I personally have been billing ÂŁ17.50 or ÂŁ18.00 per hour minimum 12 hours for the last five days, I also turned down a flat ÂŁ200 per day for ongoing work today as it involves travelling south and finding my own digs down south.
The money is out there youâve just got to stand your ground.
PS
Mr Winseer I think you really do talk a complete load of tosh at times (eg immigration, carp and swan eating ) but I do believe that you also talk a lot of common sense on subjects like not being taken for a ride by agencies and the MAN.
RSG
X 2mtd:
PS
Mr Winseer I do believe that you also talk a lot of common sense on subjects like not being taken for a ride by agencies and the MAN.RSG
+1
Just about all Companies reckon they pay âgood moneyâ trouble is all money is good BUT theres just not enough of it especially on driving.
Whilst you have âdriversâ prepared to drive a âbrand new motorâ for peanuts anybody who wants to earn a decent wage with reasonable hours after passing their expensive test soon get disillusioned and go some place else and use their licence at w/end on Agency for pin money.
Never a shortage of Drivers just a shortage of Companies prepared to pay a good decent wage
This week i have been booked for a double run. Usually i offer to do it then inform the agency later. I guess the airsoft thing is now put off for a while since me taking a Sunday off means 2 drivers are needed to cover my shift 
i can see this being an ongoing arrangement which suits me. 6 days money for a 5 day week and i donât have the driving time to do any 6th shifts so i get my 2 days off every week