Just been over to Sainsbury’s, the chaos has calmed right down and the petrol station is still serving petrol…
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Mrs Zaphod says that the queues have gone here too.
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Yep, normal service has been resumed. 
I have not long been home from Newbury, so thought I’d go and fill up, both stations have sold out!.
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It’s typical isn’t it?
You just get a car … and the next thing you know you can’t buy the petrol to put in it!
It won’t help you I know but things are definitely improving.
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Use a bit of lateral thinking, take yourself back to your childhood, sit in the car waggling the steering wheel from side to side and going ‘brumm brumm’ who needs petrol? 
When reviewing all of this panic, and blaming it on the shortage of HGV Drivers, I wonder if the Road Haulage Association has put in place a training & hiring formula such that all the new hires are trained up to the job and are paid what the union wants them to get?
That would be a plan!
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There are no shortages of tanker drivers who are better qualified needing an ADR certificate.
This situation was caused by the media confusing HGV drivers with tanker drivers they don’t bother these days to get their facts straight which in this case caused the lemmings in society to panic buy.
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@Tedc, Exactly that !! Good postTed,the only way the RHA could
disagree with that is on financial grounds,( profit!) which is their main
motive for wanting more immigration for their recruiting??
Donkeyman! 
@Tedc and @Donkeyman – The Road Haulage Association (RHA) already do a multitude of training courses, on checking this out I was surprised at how many courses they actually do and what these cover. Have a browse through these on the link below, they do seem to cover many aspects of training, for which they obviously do charge:
@Baz46 , Just looked through that link of yours Baz And it
seems to only cover management and administration courses
dealing with the legal requirements to run a transport business ??
The only one l found that MIGHT cover actual driving was
something called a CPA course,but it gave no indication of
what it consisted of ??
Donkeyman! 
@Donkeyman Yes, there are a lot of management and administration courses, there are also courses connected with actual driving (Tankers and Dangerous Goods) plus one on Emergency First Aid at Work (also see screenshot):
- Dangerous Goods Driver Training Initial Core & Packs
- Dangerous Goods Driver Training Initial Core, Packs, Tanks & Classes
- Dangerous Goods Driver Training Refresher Core, Packs & Classes
- Driver Licence Training
- Emergency First Aid at Work
Perhaps in view of the shortage of HGV drivers, particularly those who need them to supply the nation’s food, the RHA might be offering more practical driving courses in the future?
Something definitely needs doing as it’s obvious food and other goods are not getting to their required destinations. Any advice re: possible shortages at Christmas is only going to cause more panic- buying.
Just what the Media live for. 
After carefully filling their own freezers first of course. 
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As said, they’re already trying to panic people into buying before Christmas.
Here at least it doesn’t seem to be working: one local butcher has been trying to sell turkeys and gammons - a large quantity of both in a number of guises like crowns or whole and advertised via social media & elsewhere - and at good prices too but I went past this morning.
No queues in the shop, windows full of both turkey andgammon and big signs up displaying special offers in an ettempt to move them on.
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Yes, more than likely but whatever the cause and whatever needs to be done to change this we all need to continue with our usual lives. Whatever area of life you look at there’s always someone, somewhere lining their own pockets (or filling their freezers come to that).
The pandemic plus Brexit have caused serious economic difficulties as it is. If steps are not taken to do something about this the country will be in such a poor state it will take decades to recover or perhaps it never will recover.
There’s a lot to be said for that but maybe a change in direction was long overdue?
In so many ways we as a country (just like many others, it seems) have been heading in the wrong direction for years, from not training our young in the skills that are needed today to relying upon others for things like gas when we have enough of our own to be independent but nimbyism won’t let us extract it.
John Redwood makes another sensible comment upon such issues in his diary blog today:
https://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2021/10/01/bottlenecks-and-opportunities/
@Baz46 , Thanks for the effort Baz, it now seems that the blockage lies with the
testing centres to a large degree, they are reporting large backlogs in offering tests
to drivers, this has been the case for some time, but covid seems to have put the
kibosh on the whole system?? Well that’s the excuse anyway !!
Donkeyman!