Originally Posted by
ragingpup
But industry leaders appear not to agree with this:
Marco Digioia, the head of the European Road Haulers Association which represents more than 200,000 trucking companies across the country: “There is a driver shortage across Europe. I am not sure how many would want to go to the UK.”
Digioia said European driver salaries were generally higher than in Britain; new EU rules had improved working conditions; and billions of euros had been offered to fund parking areas and support companies.
“The UK doesn’t have access to any of that,” he said. “Tempting European drivers back to the UK when they also have to face the reality of customs and border checks, all the uncertainties of Brexit … We have to be realistic.”
Higher salaries, and perhaps tax incentives, might help in the short term, he said, but “a lot of money is being thrown at this whole problem in Europe right now. There’s a level playing field, and none of the Brexit-related hassle”.
Ian Wright, chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation, said that there could be as many as four million people who were available to companies at the beginning of last year but are no longer in the potential labour force. He warned of another pinch point in just a few weeks, when agency staff would be needed to deal with the autumn and Christmas peak in demand.
“I’m absolutely certain that when we get to the end of September and when we start to look at the crucial role of agency workers in the Christmas rush, there won’t be enough available,” he said.
Completely agree that the pandemic is the main factor for the world shortage but the fact that we had years of anti-immigration messaging together with the sudden introduction of EU workers needing to apply for settled status/visas to work in the UK, and then throw in the large amounts of new beurocracy for companies considering sending/buying merch from the UK, and it isn't hard to see how this country will be affected more negatively than others. It was always going to happen anyway to a lesser extent, all but the most hardened Breiters could see that there would be economic cost, but the pandemic has simply and quite cruelly blown the impact up much more than it would have done. And that isn't to say that the public weren't entitled to take an economic hit in order to reduce immigration, but to then deny the impact of that decision on the economy when everyone know what was going to happen seems a little blinkered to me.
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