Petrol queues reported now on BBC news

For us this has coincided with our adult son having had five hour heart surgery a week ago. He is doing well, thank god, but is being allowed home on a day to day basis from Saturday, as long as he comes back overnight for his blood tests etc. He is desperate to see his tiny daughter aged two, who is missing her daddy so much. This has meant us (very willingly and thankfully) ferrying him back and forth twice a day to the hospital, thus needing extra petrol. I have to get to work tomorrow and also have an urgent hospital appointment for myself, but luckily can get the bus so will leave the car at home.

No panic buying for us at the moment as we filled up last week, but I can understand why people might have to.

Currently we have enough diesel for the time being. I use the car as little as possible as we are fortunate to live close by to bus routes. Shops are within easy walking distance for me but DH has some mobility difficulties.

I’m happy that some petrol/diesel garages have put on a maximum spend. In the absence of any reasonable government action this seems rather sensible. Exceptions should be made for key/essential workers such as doctors, nurses, care workers etc. and emergency services, not forgetting those who live in rural areas who need a car for shopping.

Perhaps more people should use public transport. It would be far better for the environment.

I did start to use public transport a lot pre covid but I’m not prepared to sit on a bus wearing my mask when most of the other people don’t do so.

Masks should be compulsory on public transport, end of - and sanitising of hands too- this is the case in most if not all EU countries.

Same for shops and all public venues.

MamaCaz

Media hype might have aggravated this, but there were signs of problems over a week before this hit the news!

As I have said elsewhere, OH and I became aware that there was a potential problem well before it hit the news.

We were on holiday in a diesel vehicle, and kept passing filling stations that had no diesel (or only had Premium).
And having just checked put two of the filling stations in question, I am fairly sure that one was Esso, not BP. It wasn't just one day - it had no ordinary diesel for at least 5 days.

It's OK saying that there is no fuel shortage, but if the product you need isn't reaching the places where you need to purchase it, there really is no difference between a shortage and a supply issue!

Panic has not caused this problem - it is just a totally predictable result of it.

The problem did lie without Esso and BP, shortage of drivers not fuel.. Of course the brain dead start panic buying due to the media hype, and a possible leak from private meeting,
usa366.com/hgv-boss-accused-of-triggering-petrol-pump-crisis-ministers-point-the-finger-at-ex-bbc-man/

Exactly, and I have no idea how people can state that it will all be back to normal in days. How?

It wasn't the "brain dead" who needed to buy fuel. It was the sensible ones who need to get to work.

Maybe the government should stop treating the public as though they're brain dead, when it was perfectly obvious to those of us with more than half a functioning brain cell what was going on and it wasn't difficult to realise that we were being lied to.

Perhaps more people should use public transport. It would be far better for the environment.

Great idea, if your area has any!

Well as all the sensible ones who need to get to work tomorrow won't be queueing at petrol stations, having filled their tanks to overflowing this weekend, the rest of us won't encounter any queues and will fill up our empty tanks

It's not only those who need petrol who are filling up. My neighbour has filled up all three of his cars. He and his wife are retired and only use a car a couple of times a week for local trips. He told me so himself, with as much glee as the lady down the road who showed me her garage half full of toilet rolls when the panic buying started. She still has no idea why she bought them and spent all that money, other than everyone else was buying them, and she had to get rid of them later when the mice moved in and tore them to shreds to build nests.

A lot of ambulances do not have a dedicated fuel supply, they get petrol from the same places as you and me. If ambulances are off the road because of empty fuel tanks I do hope people will understand it was totally justified because someone needed a full tank in order to go to work, or shop, or have their vehicle sit with a full tank of petrol....... one ambulance crew posted yesterday (with photos) of how they had to go to 5 petrol stations before they could refuel.

I have been out and about in Glasgow today and didn’t notice any queues. Is this an English thing?

Suspending competition rules, which will allow delivery lorries of any company to deliver fuel to areas where there is the biggest need.

2/3rds of retailers are now out of fuel.

Competition law has already been relaxed between retailers in order to maintain food supplies.

Letters to people holding HGV licences are to be sent to encourage them back into driving.

Blimey all smacks of desperation and a government chasing its tail.

Meanwhile our domestic fuel prices are rocketing - oh well the petrol problem has taken the focus off the astronomical domestic fuel rise.

But in the long term this is going to affect the country much more.

I also fervently hope that the government is assuring supplies of medicines to the pharmacists.

All the above were warned by our civil service to be major issues post Brexit.

They sent out this warning in 2018.

Nothing was done to mitigate these crises.

Letters to people holding HGV licences are to be sent to encourage them back into driving.

I thought that was quite amusing. I wonder if my DD will get one. She had to take an HGV test in order to be able to drive our horsebox. There will be lots of under 40s who are in her position. I can't see any of them yearning to become knights if the road ?

All this has been caused by media hype and panic buying there are the same amount of tanker drivers as there were last week
Correct me if I am wrong but normal HGV drivers cannot drive a tanker they have to have a ADR license as well so it’s a specialist job

All this has been caused by government inertia and total incompetence.

Time and time again they are warned of impending crises - the latest is medicine shortage - and they do bugger all to deal with it until it is a crises and people are suffering.

We still have empty shelves, don’t forget.

Whitewavemark2 the shelves are not all empty that is erroneous.

Fuel has been delivered to filling stations, if as stated on the news buy a petrol station manager a station normally sells 8,000 litres on any given Friday and last Friday they sold 28,000 that is panic buying. How many cars are sat in people’s garages or drives with full tanks that will hardly be driven for the foreseeable.

Well there are queues, sorry.
A friend who still works sets off early sent a whats app to us at 6.45 that a local filling station had just had a delivery so I threw a coat over my pyjamas and went to fill up. That will do me for a long time but I do need to drive to the dentist this week so couldn’t avoid it. The cashier told me they had petrol but were running low on diesel but that they always keep some back for the emergency services.

rosie1959

All this has been caused by media hype and panic buying there are the same amount of tanker drivers as there were last week
Correct me if I am wrong but normal HGV drivers cannot drive a tanker they have to have a ADR license as well so it’s a specialist job

Yes this extra licence is required.

We were out on Saturday and passed a dozen garages most were closed and two had very long queues. We couldn’t stop then and didn’t want to join the panic but our car is now on the drive with about 30 miles worth of petrol left in it. We don’t have public transport here so
trying hard to keep calm
(and not panic).

Whitewavemark2 the shelves are not all empty that is erroneous.

She didn't say that they were 'all' empty. You're just compounding the error, GG13

On radio 4

EU lorry drivers union said “we will not go back to England to help them get out of the shit they created themselves”.

Yes he said shit.

Oh dear but are we surprised who can forget the scenes last Christmas?

As Richard Murphy would say, unfortunately the market is not working as the Tories expect.