Not The Politics Thread.

[Strokes]

1 minute ago, Steve_Walsh5 said:

What a fun life you must lead if you get your kicks from trying to wind people up just for your pleasure. 

It’s subjective I imagine.

[Buce]

9 minutes ago, Strokes said:

Sorry mate, even my reply was half serious. I’m currently half wasted after being at funeral since 11am.

Ignore me if you want serious debate, I’m just fishing for reactions tbh.

 

As for the rest, I hope it solves the obesity crisis.

 

Business as usual then...

[Bellend Sebastian]

I'm just pleased for my mother-in-law, whose slightly odd fantasy of returning the UK to the halcyon days of the early 1970s seems well on its way to coming true

[Strokes]

Just now, Buce said:

 

Business as usual then...

just slightly less coherent I imagine.

[Carl the Llama]

40 minutes ago, Alf Bentley said:

 

I quite agree. We should aim to reach a situation where there is only 1 lorry driver in the country.

 

Through market forces, the working man (and I mean THE working man) will be a trillionnaire.  

Genuinely lol'd at that. 

 

11 minutes ago, Strokes said:

Sorry mate, even my reply was half serious. I’m currently half wasted after being at funeral since 11am.

Ignore me if you want serious debate, I’m just fishing for reactions tbh.

 

As for the rest, I hope it solves the obesity crisis.

Hoping to finally catch a glimpse of your little soldier in the shower?

[Strokes]

Just now, Carl the Llama said:

Genuinely lol'd at that. 

 

Hoping to finally catch a glimpse of your little soldier in the shower?

Check your DMs hunny. x

[Milo]

16 minutes ago, Buce said:

 

Trouble is, while the shortage of drivers is driving up wages in transport it's also driving up transport costs, so a lot of others are paying more for their groceries while still struggling on minimum wage.

 

That's before the Tax rise and home fuel price increases are taken into account.

I really struggle with the binary 'We have to pay our staff more so will automatically raise your prices' concept of some companies.

 

A company like Tesco, for example, shouldn't automatically raise product prices because they now have to pay their drivers a decent wage. If they make, say, £1.7bn profit, can't they make £1.69bn and take the hit? 

 

I get capitalism, market forces and shareholder value, etc but is it really driven so much by the ego of one individual that they have to be seen to pump up the profits so much at the absolute expense of their customers?

 

 

 

My staff costs have risen a number of times in the past couple of years, but I never automatically pass on the full cost to my clients, just because. 

 

 

 

Makes me annoyed when the big boys be twats.  

 

[foxes1988]

48 minutes ago, Strokes said:

I’ve a couple of close friends and family drivers, so from my understanding they have more choice over routes and schedules than they ever had before. But they do all work at the same firm, so it’s not a big pool for reference I’ll give you.

They are delighted.

I think conditions will inevitable improve as we get more drivers trained but until then. With the sheer volume of work required they are going to be expected to do more especially if they are getting paid more.

 

Generally drivers have a fair amount of say in what work they do already even before this 'crisis' hit its current heights. Drivers have known for years if they don't like a particular job then there are thousands more like elsewhere so could very easily move.

 

Its always been on a more of a generally speaking kinda choice I.e. a particular driver wont do nights out or will only do distance work rather then stay local. On a day to day basis they won't be able to pick and choose.

[Strokes]

1 minute ago, foxes1988 said:

I think conditions will inevitable improve as we get more drivers trained but until then. With the sheer volume of work required they are going to be expected to do more especially if they are getting paid more.

 

Generally drivers have a fair amount of say in what work they do already even before this 'crisis' hit its current heights. Drivers have known for years if they don't like a particular job then there are thousands more like elsewhere so could very easily move.

 

Its always been on a more of a generally speaking kinda choice I.e. a particular driver wont do nights out or will only do distance work rather then stay local. On a day to day basis they won't be able to pick and choose.

Fair enough,

They are governed by the tacograph, which protects them more than other industries at least.

[foxes1988]

4 minutes ago, Strokes said:

Fair enough,

They are governed by the tacograph, which protects them more than other industries at least.

Yeah that certainly helps them thank goodness. Although the government decided to relax some of the rules to allow drivers to work slightly longer (an extra 9 hours a fortnight). Not that it would make any slight bit of difference to this problem

[Phil Bowman]

35 minutes ago, Bellend Sebastian said:

I'm just pleased for my mother-in-law, whose slightly odd fantasy of returning the UK to the halcyon days of the early 1970s seems well on its way to coming true

Not many things make me genuinely want to laugh and cry at the same time. This did.

[Strokes]

3 minutes ago, foxes1988 said:

Yeah that certainly helps them thank goodness. Although the government decided to relax some of the rules to allow drivers to work slightly longer (an extra 9 hours a fortnight). Not that it would make any slight bit of difference to this problem

I thought that was a temporary relaxation and not that uncommon?

i’ll research it in the morning.

[Alf Bentley]

44 minutes ago, Strokes said:

Sorry mate, even my reply was half serious. I’m currently half wasted after being at funeral since 11am.

Ignore me if you want serious debate, I’m just fishing for reactions tbh.

 

As for the rest, I hope it solves the obesity crisis.

 

 

My reading of your first post was quite correct, then, and my flippant response entirely appropriate.

I just misread your second post as being serious - and was forced into a serious debate that I DIDN'T want (hence my flippant reply) by that mistake. 

 

Funny things funerals. Call me weird but I enjoy them as social events. I even enjoyed my parents' funerals once the actual service was done - meeting and jawing with rarely seen relations etc.

 

As for the obesity crisis, that won't be ending for a while given the size of the meal I've just eaten.   

[foxes1988]

1 minute ago, Strokes said:

I thought that was a temporary relaxation and not that uncommon?

i’ll research it in the morning.

It is temporary yes. It is uncommon though the only other time I recall them doing that was when covid first hit last year as they  wanted to make sure shops were stocked

[foxes1988]

24 minutes ago, Milo said:

I really struggle with the binary 'We have to pay our staff more so will automatically raise your prices' concept of some companies.

 

A company like Tesco, for example, shouldn't automatically raise product prices because they now have to pay their drivers a decent wage. If they make, say, £1.7bn profit, can't they make £1.69bn and take the hit? 

 

I get capitalism, market forces and shareholder value, etc but is it really driven so much by the ego of one individual that they have to be seen to pump up the profits so much at the absolute expense of their customers?

 

 

 

My staff costs have risen a number of times in the past couple of years, but I never automatically pass on the full cost to my clients, just because. 

 

 

 

Makes me annoyed when the big boys be twats.  

 

The supermarkets and amazon's of this world generally just try and dick on everyone they can tbh.  They make small suppliers sign contracts where if they supply them late then they pay them a fines of £500/£1000. Especially annoying if your sending them 300 quids worth of stuff it

 

Generally haulage companies have been increasing their prices I would guesstimate from 25% - 60% in the last couple of months.

 

Maybe they don't do this to the big supermarkets and amazon's of this world as they have such power in the market but all that will do is mean smaller medium business struggling even more to compete with these larger companies.

[zorro en españa]

Please allow me to share with you a chat I recently had with a Spanish lorry driver (admittedly before the driver shortage came to prominence).

He lived and worked in England from 2013 until early last year and rented accommodation in Hertfordshire with two other compatriots.  He had applied for, and had received, settled status.

Initially he returned to Spain because his mother was hospitalised (COVID).  He remained here out of work until he found employment driving lorries in August last year. He openly admitted that he believed what he was going to earn here was going to be about 70% of what he would be able to earn driving in the UK.  His new job is effectively the same trip (base-drop off-base = 50 miles).

This is what he tells me:
* Living in Hertfordshire they were paying £1,600 pm rent
* In Spain he has bought himself a new apartment for €90k
* He had calculated the 70% predicted income on how many trips he thought he would be able to do (he admits calculated on his experience of what it was like driving in the UK) and, effectively, his round trip here is unhindered.  He is nearing 85% of his UK income.
* As there are about 100 lorries doing the round trip he enthuses about the camaraderie of his driving colleagues as they enjoy their two hour lunch break each day.
* He knew he missed his family and friends but the realisation has hit home.  He is back to Spain to stay.  I am pleased to say his mother lives on.
* His two friends have also returned to Spain - both now driving here.

He is a man in his 40s but I can see that many of the drivers are in their 50s.  What is noticeable is you only have to be in one of the restaurants on the route to understand/ feel that camaraderie he mentioned. It adds pleasure and relaxation to their working day.

Make of this what you want.  For me, if this is typically what people who have opted to leave the UK are finding, I don’t think there will be a massive urge to return.  I’m not naive enough to realise, of course, that “money talks”.
 

[Strokes]

9 minutes ago, zorro en españa said:

Please allow me to share with you a chat I recently had with a Spanish lorry driver (admittedly before the driver shortage came to prominence).

He lived and worked in England from 2013 until early last year and rented accommodation in Hertfordshire with two other compatriots.  He had applied for, and had received, settled status.

Initially he returned to Spain because his mother was hospitalised (COVID).  He remained here out of work until he found employment driving lorries in August last year. He openly admitted that he believed what he was going to earn here was going to be about 70% of what he would be able to earn driving in the UK.  His new job is effectively the same trip (base-drop off-base = 50 miles).

This is what he tells me:
* Living in Hertfordshire they were paying £1,600 pm rent
* In Spain he has bought himself a new apartment for €90k
* He had calculated the 70% predicted income on how many trips he thought he would be able to do (he admits calculated on his experience of what it was like driving in the UK) and, effectively, his round trip here is unhindered.  He is nearing 85% of his UK income.
* As there are about 100 lorries doing the round trip he enthuses about the camaraderie of his driving colleagues as they enjoy their two hour lunch break each day.
* He knew he missed his family and friends but the realisation has hit home.  He is back to Spain to stay.  I am pleased to say his mother lives on.
* His two friends have also returned to Spain - both now driving here.

He is a man in his 40s but I can see that many of the drivers are in their 50s.  What is noticeable is you only have to be in one of the restaurants on the route to understand/ feel that camaraderie he mentioned. It adds pleasure and relaxation to their working day.

Make of this what you want.  For me, if this is typically what people who have opted to leave the UK are finding, I don’t think there will be a massive urge to return.  I’m not naive enough to realise, of course, that “money talks”.
 

Quality of life > money.

 

Fair play to him and all the others that have left I hope they experience the same. One day it might be the same here too.

[zorro en españa]

5 hours ago, foxes1988 said:

Most countries are not struggling to the degree the UK is and has been for years.

 

Due to an ageing driving population which we haven't been replacing sufficiently for years.  Well we a replaced little have using EU drivers although a large amount of these have now returned home due to Brexit and the new IR35 regs the government put into place. 

 

Then we have a higher demand for economic covid recovery and high amount of UK drivers retireing and moving out of the industry we've got a problem which isn't going away for quite a while.  Driver agencys are charging more and haulage companies are paying more.  The haulage companies due to these extra costs are putting cost up from between 25 - 60% so expect costs in shops and online for a lot of items to go up substantially in the next year.

This is an excellent post.  
 

 You identify a number of things feeding into the equation but price inflation is inevitable.  We can all profess to say XY and Z should be paid more but really it is acknowledging what XY and Z bring to the functionality of the country that needs recognition with remuneration more evenly balanced.

 

I have no idea how long countries are going to be held to account for balancing the books of the last two years but wage inflation isn’t going to help.  Money can be found I know - but it is not helped by spaffing tax payers’ money up the wall.  We will see how diligent some countries have been against one another in due course.

[WigstonWanderer]

2 hours ago, Milo said:

I really struggle with the binary 'We have to pay our staff more so will automatically raise your prices' concept of some companies.

 

A company like Tesco, for example, shouldn't automatically raise product prices because they now have to pay their drivers a decent wage. If they make, say, £1.7bn profit, can't they make £1.69bn and take the hit? 

 

I get capitalism, market forces and shareholder value, etc but is it really driven so much by the ego of one individual that they have to be seen to pump up the profits so much at the absolute expense of their customers?

 

 

 

My staff costs have risen a number of times in the past couple of years, but I never automatically pass on the full cost to my clients, just because. 

 

 

 

Makes me annoyed when the big boys be twats.  

 

Is that really how capitalism works though? Leaving aside individual supplier responses and preferences such as those those of your good self, increased costs put upward pressure on prices. Whether an individual supplier can pass on these costs depends on demand and the response of other suppliers of similar goods. Just supply & demand.

Edited 23 September 2021 by WigstonWanderer

[Sampson]

3 hours ago, zorro en españa said:

Please allow me to share with you a chat I recently had with a Spanish lorry driver (admittedly before the driver shortage came to prominence).

He lived and worked in England from 2013 until early last year and rented accommodation in Hertfordshire with two other compatriots.  He had applied for, and had received, settled status.

Initially he returned to Spain because his mother was hospitalised (COVID).  He remained here out of work until he found employment driving lorries in August last year. He openly admitted that he believed what he was going to earn here was going to be about 70% of what he would be able to earn driving in the UK.  His new job is effectively the same trip (base-drop off-base = 50 miles).

This is what he tells me:
* Living in Hertfordshire they were paying £1,600 pm rent
* In Spain he has bought himself a new apartment for €90k
* He had calculated the 70% predicted income on how many trips he thought he would be able to do (he admits calculated on his experience of what it was like driving in the UK) and, effectively, his round trip here is unhindered.  He is nearing 85% of his UK income.
* As there are about 100 lorries doing the round trip he enthuses about the camaraderie of his driving colleagues as they enjoy their two hour lunch break each day.
* He knew he missed his family and friends but the realisation has hit home.  He is back to Spain to stay.  I am pleased to say his mother lives on.
* His two friends have also returned to Spain - both now driving here.

He is a man in his 40s but I can see that many of the drivers are in their 50s.  What is noticeable is you only have to be in one of the restaurants on the route to understand/ feel that camaraderie he mentioned. It adds pleasure and relaxation to their working day.

Make of this what you want.  For me, if this is typically what people who have opted to leave the UK are finding, I don’t think there will be a massive urge to return.  I’m not naive enough to realise, of course, that “money talks”.
 

Funnily enough, the lorry driver and 2 forklift drivers who've gone back to Eastern Europe in our warehouse all have similar stories - all were still here at new year and all 3 applied for either settled or pre-settled status. All received it (though the guy I talked to said he didn't actually receive his confirmation for it until about April time which was about a month after he'd gone home and decided not to come back), but all have gone home since and decided not to come back. 2 of them I didn't know very well and have just heard about through colleagues. One guy I knew quite well and has gone back to Poland, I messaged him on social media quite recently and he said that even though the pay conditions aren't as good, his living conditions are actually better in Poland, because in the UK he could only afford a room in a shared house with 5 other strangers. Whereas back in Poland he's been able to afford renting an apartment on his own close to his family and said he's been able to get close to his family again and hadn't seen much of for a few years.

Edited 23 September 2021 by Sampson

[UpTheLeagueFox]

4 hours ago, Strokes said:

I’m just fishing for reactions tbh.

 

4 hours ago, Steve_Walsh5 said:

What a fun life you must lead if you get your kicks from trying to wind people up just for your pleasure. 

Yeah come on @Strokes please stop trying to wind up the easily triggered in this thread, you're better than that darling xxxx  

[Alf Bentley]

It was good to see some decent coverage of the German election on C4 News last night - with more due tonight.

 

The lack of coverage by the BBC has been shocking.

I know that a lot of news/analysis will always rightly focus on domestic events, but despite leaving the EU we're still part of the continent of Europe - and impacted by events and politics there.

 

Germany is the most economically and politically powerful nation in our neighbourhood - and it's about to change its leader and probably its govt, so the lack of news coverage seems shockingly insular.

Merkel has led Germany for 15 years but finishes the day after tomorrow. That matters to us, doesn'it it?

 

It's as yet unclear what govt will emerge from the election - a coalition led by Scholz's SPD (centre-left) with the Greens and Free Democrats (liberal right) seems most likely. Far Right and Far Left both likely to have parliamentary representation.

But at different times, polls have shown Merkel's centre-right Christian Democrats in the lead and the Greens in the lead - and the Greens still lead among younger voters.

 

There was wall-to-wall news coverage of the Biden-Trump election, though coverage of US politics, particularly Congress, still seems shallow. Yet barely a word about a generational shift in German politics? 

Just a few issues where the nature of the German Govt surely affects us: economic policy (as Europe's economic leader); EU-UK relations post-Brexit; climate change (with its recent pro-coal, anti-nuke energy policy & the Greens likely to be in Govt); military alliances around the world, at a time when NATO & other alliances seem in flux....

[Dunge]

26 minutes ago, Alf Bentley said:

It was good to see some decent coverage of the German election on C4 News last night - with more due tonight.

 

The lack of coverage by the BBC has been shocking.

I know that a lot of news/analysis will always rightly focus on domestic events, but despite leaving the EU we're still part of the continent of Europe - and impacted by events and politics there.

 

Germany is the most economically and politically powerful nation in our neighbourhood - and it's about to change its leader and probably its govt, so the lack of news coverage seems shockingly insular.

Merkel has led Germany for 15 years but finishes the day after tomorrow. That matters to us, doesn'it it?

 

It's as yet unclear what govt will emerge from the election - a coalition led by Scholz's SPD (centre-left) with the Greens and Free Democrats (liberal right) seems most likely. Far Right and Far Left both likely to have parliamentary representation.

But at different times, polls have shown Merkel's centre-right Christian Democrats in the lead and the Greens in the lead - and the Greens still lead among younger voters.

 

There was wall-to-wall news coverage of the Biden-Trump election, though coverage of US politics, particularly Congress, still seems shallow. Yet barely a word about a generational shift in German politics? 

Just a few issues where the nature of the German Govt surely affects us: economic policy (as Europe's economic leader); EU-UK relations post-Brexit; climate change (with its recent pro-coal, anti-nuke energy policy & the Greens likely to be in Govt); military alliances around the world, at a time when NATO & other alliances seem in flux....

I think it’s interesting, but not necessarily important - certainly not in the same way Biden/Trump was, or the next presidential election over there. I assume there will be more coverage once the German election has happened, and there’s no doubt Germany is about to step into a new era following its stabilising force of Merkel. Whether it really has that big an effect on us I think is debatable. The EU will go on being the EU, it doesn’t look like either extreme wing has a shot at power, and they’re not so demonstrative as the French generally. It’d be particularly interesting if the Greens got the highest vote percentage, and what that might mean for environmental policy, although even that isn’t nearly as big for environmental policy as Democrats vs Trump, which is a potential disaster waiting to happen.

 

I think it’s a Newsnight-esque talking point rather than something to command a prime spot on the main news right now. Maybe when the result comes in.

 

For now, I’m far more interested in whether or not Keir Starmer gets his proposed leader election changes through, because I think that potentially has much greater bearing on this country’s future.

[foxes1988]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-58670355

Definitely needs some regs and government level intervention in the housing market.

 

Not sure on the first time buyer new house 'first dibs' policy. I think someone moving from their first home to their second home is not really much of a problem.

 

Surely it's the investment buyers we are trying to hold back isn't it?

[Alf Bentley]

27 minutes ago, Dunge said:

I think it’s interesting, but not necessarily important - certainly not in the same way Biden/Trump was, or the next presidential election over there. I assume there will be more coverage once the German election has happened, and there’s no doubt Germany is about to step into a new era following its stabilising force of Merkel. Whether it really has that big an effect on us I think is debatable. The EU will go on being the EU, it doesn’t look like either extreme wing has a shot at power, and they’re not so demonstrative as the French generally. It’d be particularly interesting if the Greens got the highest vote percentage, and what that might mean for environmental policy, although even that isn’t nearly as big for environmental policy as Democrats vs Trump, which is a potential disaster waiting to happen.

 

I think it’s a Newsnight-esque talking point rather than something to command a prime spot on the main news right now. Maybe when the result comes in.

 

For now, I’m far more interested in whether or not Keir Starmer gets his proposed leader election changes through, because I think that potentially has much greater bearing on this country’s future.

 

Fair points - and you may well be right that the change of govt will make little difference, certainly less difference than Biden v. Trump. Especially as Scholz, the SPD leader & current favourite to be Chancellor, is reputedly a centrist & Merkel's current deputy.

 

Even so, although I wouldn't expect the German election to top the news bulletins, I'd expect some coverage and  analysis further down the bulletin.....I've literally seen nothing on the BBC.

 

Merkel seemed to play a key role in Brexit negotiations behind the scenes, but what stance if any will Germany take in future Brexit issues (trade barriers, N. Ireland)? What stance would a govt including Greens take on the Russian gas pipeline or climate change re. coal-fired power stations v. nukes? Who even are Scholz, Laschet & Baerbock (the 3 potential leaders of the most powerful nation on our continent) personally and politically? I think there should be SOME coverage of that - and I'm sure there has been such coverage in the past. Aside from USA and major events like Afghanistan, news coverage seems to be becoming more insular.