The UK is facing huge fuel shortages and panic-buying at filling stations amid a volley of simultaneous crises. The situation has gotten so bad that the UK government now has the military on standby in order to transport fuel to where it is most needed.
The main cause of the crisis is the combination of both the pandemic and Brexit. The pandemic has caused global supply chains to be backlogged and has stopped shipments being made at their usual speed, while Brexit has meant that thousands of lorry drivers from the EU are no longer available to drive the fuel lorries from the main petrol and gas depots to the filling-stations where consumers purchase it.
As fuel begins to run out at filling stations, cars have queued for hours to fill up their tanks, leaving many dry within a very short period of time.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has stated that he believes the situation will be resolved shortly. However, others suggest that the situation could continue for months even if drastic action is taken. The PM said:
"We now are starting to see the situation improve. We are hearing from industry that supplies are coming back onto the forecourt in the normal way and I would just really urge everybody to go about their business in the normal way."
"What we want to do is make sure that we have all the preparations necessary to get through until Christmas and beyond, not just in supplying the petrol stations but all parts of our supply chain."
The haulage industry, which overseas the transportation of fuel, has said that they were tens of thousands of drivers short even before the pandemic and this will take months to resolve. The UK government has now even said that it is willing to give visas to European drivers in order to fill the vacant positions. Many European drivers have rejected these proposals saying they are an insult after the country voted to take away their right to work in the UK at the 2016 Brexit referendum.
The Brexit supporting Prime Minister Boris Johnson was questioned on the visa scheme for European drivers, to which he said:
"What I don't think people in this country want to do is fix all our problems with uncontrolled immigration again. We tried that for a long time... and in the end people could see it was leading to a low-wage, low-skill approach."
The shortage of haulage drivers means that other industries are also affected and that food supplies could also be affected. The UK is already being affected by a dramatic shortage in CO2 and a price surge in natural gas, which threatens to disrupt the food supply chain.
[h/t: Reuters]
COMMENTS