UK lorry drivers plan to strike over low pay and
poor working conditions
Nearly 3,000 hauliers are proposing a ‘stay at home’
day, prompting fears over already creaking food supply chains
@townsendmark
Sat 24 Jul
2021 17.52 BST
Lorry
drivers are planning a nationwide strike over their working conditions,
prompting warnings that this would magnify food shortages and cripple the
country’s already creaking supply chains.
Hauliers
are proposing a “stay at home” day next month in response to low pay and
working terms, an event designed to compound the effect of the UK’s
lorry-driver shortage , which last week led to widespread stock shortages.
However the Road Haulage Association, which represents commercial road haulage
companies and has more than 7,000 members, warned drivers against taking action
saying it would make a “bad situation worse” and severely disrupt automated
chains.
So far the
“stay at home” action on 23 August has attracted nearly 3,000 HGV drivers with
another 340 joining last week. Lorry driver Mark Schubert said: “For far too
many years we have been ignored, exploited and taken for granted. Now our time
has come, now we have a window of opportunity to be listened to.”
Speaking on
Friday afternoon from a traffic jam on the way to Norwich, Schubert added that
he had never seen such momentum for change in his near 40-year career as a
driver.
“We are
trying to send a message that drivers are thoroughly fed up with the way they
are treated by employers. Yet as long as stuff’s on the shelf, people don’t
seem to give a damn about us.”
However
Kate Gibbs of the RHA cautioned against any action that may heighten the effect
of driver shortages, itself compounded by the “pingdemic”, which has seen food
supply-chains hit as workers self-isolate.
Even the
exemption of about 10,000 workers at 500 food distribution centres from
quarantine does not appear to have offset the effect of the current shortage of
100,000 lorry drivers. On Friday, the supermarkets Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury’s
began asking suppliers for extra payments to cover the costs of raising wages
for delivery drivers in a desperate move to offset shortages.
Gibbs said:
“We understand the drivers’ frustration but downing tools is not the way
forward. We don’t want to make a bad situation worse. A supply chain that runs
like clockwork only requires the tiniest thing to throw it out completely.
“If you
think things are bad now it’ll just make things so much worse.”
Empty
supermarket shelves are seen on 23 July, 2021 in London. Luke Pollard, shadow
environment secretary, said food supply security is fundamental and empty
shelves ‘show the system is failing’.
Last week,
the government unveiled plans to help tackle the lorry driver crisis, including
easing driver qualification requirements and improved working conditions.
However Schubert is among those who believe these not only fail to tackle the
sector’s concerns but could also take at least six months to take effect,
failing to tackle the threat of food shortages this summer.
He also
said that the effects of Brexit, which is believed to have forced around 25,000
truckers to return to the EU, had been underscored by the Home Office’s
hardline posturing since. “Looking at the way [the home secretary] Priti Patel
and her cohorts in the Home Office treat foreigners, they’re not going to be
overly keen on coming back,” he said.
“Even if
they can, are they going to be treated like criminals when they arrive at the
border? This issue can’t be solved overnight. Even if you allow east European
drivers on short-term work visas this is going to take six months to two years
to fix.”
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