BS Fuel fiasco

Subject: BS Fuel fiasco
From: s&r
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 08:20 AM

"The Petrol Retailers Association said it is waiting for "practical and well-considered" leadership from the Government during the growing fuel crisis."

Patience needed here then

Stu

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: glueman
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 08:27 AM

As a non-consumer of media in any form, I didn't know there was a petrol supply issue until a guy with a microphone on the check out desk told me I'd missed a sign saying there was no unleaded. I smiled and waved which seemed to make him even grumpier.

What's the issue behind this 'crisis'? Has the world run out of oil?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: nutty
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 09:18 AM

The issue was created when the PM told people not to panic.

Who trusts the government? Not me.

I went out and filled up straight away - but then the tank was showing empty.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: s&r
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 09:26 AM

I think he misread his autocue - it said DON'T PANIC and was intended as a humorous quote.....

Stu

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 09:42 AM

There MIGHT be a delivery drivers strike after Easter.

If I believed in conspiracy theories I might think that the government statements that started it all were a deliberate attempt to cause panic to give them an excuse to attack the unions. On the other hand they might just be a bunch of incompitent wankers.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: theleveller
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 09:53 AM

Probably both!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Owen Woodson
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 09:57 AM

Can someone tell me, if there is a tanker drivers strike, with consequent fuel shortages, and the country grinding to a halt, how are they going to get the hot cornish pasties to the pie shops so that they can qualify for VAT?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 10:07 AM

One of the papers this morning said the panic buying in England so far has raised an extra £32 million in revenue for the Government.

Where there was no petrol shortage, this set of wankers in power have now created one.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 10:19 AM

The extra £32 million revenue would only pertain if people drove so much more that they used up very quickly the extra top-ups they've bought. As most folk will presumably drive the same amount of distance as usual, I can't see how there could be any extra revenue. In fairness to the Government, even if they hadn't said anything, the merest whisper of a possible tanker dispute would have sent people whizzing off to the pumps. It's been the same with any threatened shortages, sugar, bread etc etc. People are only human. It's all very well for them to say 'Don't panic-buy' , folk have to get to work and businesses have to carry on. This situation has at least diverted attention from the myriad daftnesses of David Cameron in recent weeks!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 10:22 AM

PS Shouldn't this thread perhaps be below the line? It isn't musical.
Perhaps "You fill me up..." or "Oil be seeing you..." or even "Pump pump pump me boys!" Any further suggestions?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Musket
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 11:00 AM

When you consider that the civil servants who try to control Ministers are in the main members of emergency and escalation planning committees, and that the first rule of any emergency planning regime is to do all you can to prevent mass panic...

Makes you think. Makes me think we have a loose cannon government who are not fit to govern, putting ideological "turn the people against the possible strikers" above their duty to the country.

Unlike previous administrations, this time something can be done. it just takes the weasel mouthed Judas's in the Lib Dem to realise there is just one thing they can do to possibly stop them from disappearing all together ; Resign from Government and support Milliband for one day, the day it takes to ask HMQ to dissolve Parliament and get a general election ahead of the fixed term.

I am not sure at all that Labour are either ready or capable of running the country again, but Cameron is not fit for purpose, his Ministers aren't and his backers speak for themselves... Someone somewhere needs a mandate to run the country.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,JOB
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 12:51 PM

Petrol at 99 cents a litre here in Dublin today. I damned well missed it.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2012/0330/1224314098478.html

The standard price, by the by, is €1.60 upwards.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 03:00 PM

It is no longer just a fiasco.
We now have a very serious burns case caused directly by someone following advice of a senior Government Minister and filling her house with petrol, then trying to give some to her daughter who couldn't buy petrol because of Government sponsored panic buying.
Full story here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-17560534.
Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 03:11 PM

And will ' call me ' Dave Cameron and Francis Maudsley take the responsability for this ? like bollocks they will. If Maudsley won't resign he should be sacked.


Dave H

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Megan L
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 03:53 PM

WHY cant people accept responsibility for thier own stupidity. Anyone with half a brain should understand you do not mess with highly flamible liquids and under NO circumstances keep them in the house.

The government can tell you to jump of a cliff the choice to do so is yours alone.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 04:16 PM

Good heavens. I agree with Mither again!

Wincanton ferally controls 80% of petrol delivery and cuts corners on safety/cost. Its drivers earn 25% less than those at its nearest competitor.

Why is no-one demanding that Wincanton "be reasonable"?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 04:24 PM

Petrol companies used to employ their own drivers, then they farmed the work out to sub contractors. When they did so originally it was on a long term basis, up to 10 years. Now it's down to 3 and 4 year contracts, and it's all awarded on price. That's why corners and wages are cut.
As if the big petrol companies weren't making enough money!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 30 Mar 12 - 06:08 PM

The current dispute is about the delivery companies cutting safety standards for drivers moving vast amounts of explosive liquids. Forcing them into such rapid turnaround times that they are likely to become a serious danger to public safety.
What is the Tory Government's response?
Oh Yes!
Remove the legal limit on the length of time a tanker driver is allowed to drive, despite the fact that he is at that point legally regarded as unfit to drive.
What next - The cars that disappear in a tanker fireball on the M1 are to blame because they should have more sense than to drive on a motorway infested by sleeping petrol tanker drivers?
We have a government who couldn't give a damn about the safety of ANY citizen.
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Bainbo
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 05:03 AM

As a trade unionist, I take some comfort - and not a little amusement - from the fact that the government, through its incompetence in encouraging a panic, has strengthened the union's hand when it comes to negotiations.

The union hasn't even called a strike - and, thanks to the government, just look what happens at the mere threat of one. The unspoken subtext must now be: "Imagine what would happen if we were to actually call a strike."

I imagine Cameron was trying to invoke the spirit of Maggie, who stockpiled coal before the miners' strike. Dopey Dave thought he could get us all to do our own individual stockpiling, by persuading us that the evil unions were a personal threat to each and every one of us.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 05:10 AM

Bearing in mind that most people drive at least 300 miles a week at about 30mpg and don't have garages where were we going to store all those jerricans anyway, while waiting for them to catch fire?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Leadfingers
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 07:05 AM

A Cabinet Minister who who tells 'The People' to break the law should be Prosecuted NOT just sacked !
It is Illegal to have more than two Five litre 'Legal' continers of petrol , and a standard Jerrycan is 20 litres .

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 07:48 AM

"Bearing in mind that most people drive at least 300 miles a week"

No doubt "research has shown........."!!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: bubblyrat
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 09:30 AM

As well as the story of the woman who decanted petrol in her kitchen while the gas cooker was lit (with,sadly , predictably catastrophic results ) , is the account of an elderly lady who,despite lifting the rear hatch to hide her activities , was disvovered by garage staff to be filling 20 empty paint-tins and a tray full of jam jars with petrol to take home ! The mind boggles ,but then there must be some females out there who have no idea of how volatile petrol is , or indeed even how a petrol engine works .Time for another Ministry of Information film I think , although it's just been abolished (the MOI) ........just when it was really needed !

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 09:48 AM

Bozo, you are an accountant, and perhaps therefore you can count, as opposed to merely being a count.

http://www.car-insurance-information.org/average-annual-car-miles-uk.html.

Take 15,600 miles as a reasonable mid-range-ish figure from that.

Divide by 52.

Well, what do you know? 300 miles per week.

Dimshit.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Musket
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 12:05 PM

Yeah, I do about 300 miles a week. (That's two things Bridge and I agree on in this thread. He'll be posting me samples from his wine cellar next...)

Interestingly, my responsible adult filled up at the Doncaster Sainsbury's early Friday morning just as she always does, and I filled up this morning at the Jet in our village, just as I usually do. Neither of us saw queues, both were straight in, filled and out.

I presume the people who were panicked by irresponsible crime encouraging ministers will take a week or two to empty their tanks before the next set of queues?

Fine; So long as I have enough for next week, (easy, hardly going anywhere) and to get me to the airport just after Easter, then I'm out of the way for three weeks at my son's wedding in Africa. It occurred to me that I was going TO a country where politicians can be off the wall and civil unrest is always waiting in the wings. Starting to adjust my perspective...

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 05:43 PM

A cynical man might conclude that the reason for Unite's decision not to wreck everybody's Easter break with a delivery drivers' strike, is simply that, with everybody's tank full of fuel, it would be pointless.

Perhaps the government weren't so dumb?

The result is that there is now an obvious way to prevent the nasty union practice of hitting the holidays of working folks' who have nothing to do with the dispute.

The government don't even need to tell us in the future. We can simply fill up one or two weeks before.

Of course, Francis Maude should be fired for his "advice", in spite of the fact that he can't be blamed for the woman's burns because he didn't advise anybody to do what she did. He is, however, a liability and should go, preferably along with Pickles.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 06:17 PM

Interesting Ian. There was a lot of panic buying round Dorchester and Weymoutgh - huge queues and some petrol stations ran out of petrol.

i don't think you can blame anybody if someone decants petrol in their kitchen with the gas ring lit. Lets face it - they're only going to walk outside and hit themselves over the head with a sledge hammer. Bleeding incredible!

I say keep it up Dave!

The coalition have solved the fuel crisis. Well done lads! (and their chauffeurs!)

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 31 Mar 12 - 07:33 PM

Don - check what Unite is really on about. Oh - sorry, you don't care do you. You'd rather doff your cap and tug your forelock.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Musket
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 09:29 AM

Yeah Al, I have family in Weymouth and they mentioned it on the phone the other day.

(When I visit, I always fill near the Tesco off the Dorchester bypass on the way up from Weymouth when starting the long slog home, but I digress...)

What I am waiting for is Monday. Logic dictates (usually wrongly) that as well as filling a tank, some may conserve a tank too so if the roads are quieter, all the better for me, as I try to hit Leeds City Centre in the morning.

Don - Pickles has been a liability since he was a councillor in Bradford. If the media wanted him gone, there are enough skeletons from his murky local politics past, but I think the media are more interested in celebrity, even in politics so his absurd appearance and stupid comments that belie his obvious lack of intelligence are more fun for tomorrow's fish and chip wrappers.

Nothing to do with this thread but I think Pickles is the most dangerous risk to good government they have got, and despite being a person who tries to agree sometimes with individual things governments do on merit, I have issues taking Cameron's cabinet seriously whilst Pickles holds a Ministerial warrant. He is destroying local government, exacerbating the position of thousands who need good social care and destroying any hope of residential social care being funded to any decent level of fitness for purpose.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 12:09 PM

I drive little more than 6000 miles per year, including business, trips to polo matches, gigs and airports and generally having fun!!!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 12:57 PM

I do about 3,500 miles per annum Maximum, usually less.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 05:40 PM

Well, average mileage is as set out on the link I gave. Fact.

But (dammit) I'm going to have to agree with Mither AGAIN - Pickles is a cartoon fule.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 06:07 PM

""Don - check what Unite is really on about. Oh - sorry, you don't care do you. You'd rather doff your cap and tug your forelock.""

Cheap shot, and unjustified because you of all people know me better than that.

Let's see you deny that trade unions (not just, but including, Unite) deliberately attempt to destroy the holidays of working people who have nothing to do with the disputes in question.

Favourite targets are Easter, School Summer Holidays and Christmas, with the odd Bank Holiday thrown in for good measure.

They do so in the hope that the population is stupid enough to automatically blame the bosses rather than those who cynically choose the timing to cause maximum damage to their fellow workers.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 01 Apr 12 - 06:22 PM

Still, at least you are unwittingly agreeing with me (shock! Horror!) since it is I who suggested, ahead of Ian, that Pickles is a liability and should go.

I also agreed with those who said Maude should go.

Contrary to what you would like to believe, I do take issue with parts of what my side is doing.

Sorry to disappoint, but we are not all as unfeeling as you would have the world believe.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 02 Apr 12 - 03:35 AM

Left to his own devices Eric Pickles like his alter ego Mr. Creosote, will eventually explode.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 Apr 12 - 09:31 AM

Any relation to Wilfred Pickles?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: bubblyrat
Date: 02 Apr 12 - 10:24 AM

If Pickles eats up all the Tiddy Oggies and explodes, he'll have solved two problems in one foul swoop (as Mrs Malaprop might say ).

   Anyway, it now appears that the "Unite" tanker drivers are raking it in , getting masses of highly-paid overtime by doing all the extra deliveries needed in order to replenish the fuel stocks depleted by the panic over the possible strike !!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 02 Apr 12 - 01:30 PM

""   Anyway, it now appears that the "Unite" tanker drivers are raking it in , getting masses of highly-paid overtime by doing all the extra deliveries needed in order to replenish the fuel stocks depleted by the panic over the possible strike !! ""

And I'll lay odds that they're not complaining about the "Health and Safety" issues surrounding rapid multiple deliveries either, while the bonanza lasts.

It was always about the money!

The safety aspect was introduced specifically to obscure that fact.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 03 Apr 12 - 04:27 AM

And Wincanton drivers still get paid 25% less than those at the next largest forecourt fuel delivery contractor.

Your last sentence, Don, is purest invention. Why am I not surprised?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: banjoman
Date: 03 Apr 12 - 06:35 AM

Sign outside a local pub
"Threatened strike by Beer delivery drivers - Top up now"

So we can all take heart and enjoy a bit of panic buying and boost the coffers of the rich and uncaring chancellor

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: EBarnacle
Date: 03 Apr 12 - 11:37 PM

Gee, on this side of the pond, the oil processors [They certainly do not produce anything, just change it from one form to another.] have shut down several refineries and since there is now a shortage of processed fuel [bullshit] are charging more for the same amount.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,SPB Cooperator
Date: 04 Apr 12 - 06:11 AM

Today is the last day to panic water your garden in London

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 04 Apr 12 - 06:31 AM

""Your last sentence, Don, is purest invention. Why am I not surprised?""

Not invention, but a reasonable conclusion, based on the FACT that the safety issue has miraculously disappeared while there is overtime to be had.

It will no doubt miraculously reappear as soon as Unite enters negotiation with the management.

Let me say this. I am as pissed off as anybody by this business of farming out chunks of work to contractors who rip off workers and as far as that is concerned I am entirely on the side of those men.

No need, though, to wrap it up in a spurious cloak of sympathy grabbing nonsense.

If safety were the issue, invoking driving regulations would suffice to sort it, but they haven't apparently done that.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 04 Apr 12 - 02:53 PM

SPB Co-operator, God Himself has watered our garden today - it's poured down and our little valley is flooded again! Water shortage my foot!

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: banjoman
Date: 05 Apr 12 - 05:45 AM

What is rain?

Subject: RE: BS Fuel fiasco
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 05 Apr 12 - 06:41 AM

Water shortage my foot!
Despite the rain you can still walk in the bed of our local chalk stream without getting your feet wet.