BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?

Subject: BS:UK Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:24 PM

Unless I have grasped thge wrong end of the stick, the UK government are considering the use of forces to deliver petrol.

Now that raises some questions with me.

(1) Who is going to pay for it? I strongly object to any additional public money being put into this unless the government puts money back into public services that protect the most vulnerable.

(2) As defence budget are being cut, where are the resources going to be diverted from?

(3) Wasn't there a country in Europe in the late 1930's that used forces to enforce government policy?

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:32 PM

Are there any Forces left in UK? They all seem to be elsewhere where IMO they've no business to be!

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: gnu
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:35 PM

Why is the UK government considering the use of forces to deliver petrol?

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:37 PM

I'll listen more intently to the next new bulletin, but it looks like there is a threat of a fuel blockade

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:39 PM

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17502973

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: gnu
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:56 PM

"fuel blockade" Where? Who?

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: gnu
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 01:57 PM

Sorry... just got the link.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: gnu
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 02:05 PM

Fact is, ya can't shut the UK down, can ya? This has to go to binding arbitration... no?

Maybe this a terrible thing to say, especially because I don't know the wages or working conditions, but they are truck drivers. Drive truck - pump fuel - write up invoice. The guy in the produce department at my grocery store has more training. If he goes on strike, he doesn't shut the economy down.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 04:51 PM

If there is a time machine that can take us to the Thatcherite 80s, why can't it take us back to the 60s and 70s? I liked them!

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: vectis
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 05:06 PM

With inflation at almost 20%? I think you are remembering a dream Richard.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 06:10 PM

Inflation rising to 22.9% by 1979.
Interest rates rising to 15.9%.
Three day weeks.
Wildcat strikes
40% pay demands
Devaluation of the pound.
Industry uncompetitive and dying on its feet (later blamed on Maggie) with up to 100 days of wildcat strikes per year for some of our best manufacturers.

Ah!... the good old days of labour government.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Rapparee
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 06:19 PM

"Use the Forces, Luke...."

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: GUEST,Bluesman
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 07:16 PM

This coalition government received a chalice poisoned by years of a Labour government. Yes the measures they are taking may seem harsh, but no treatment worth it's salt is without pain.

Gone are the days when unions and red card holders could hold the country to ransom.

Ian Paisley did it in the early seventies when I was serving in Ulster, he closed down power stations, petrol stations, railway stations and the road network.

Please allow this government to get on with the job in hand. We will come out of it richer, wiser and rewarded.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 01:16 AM

The bitter orange as an example! Truly wonderful!

For most people, life in the 60s and 70s in the UK was better than they'd ever had it before.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: GUEST,Bluesman
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 04:17 AM

Ah a great decade Richard.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 04:21 AM

As I discussed with my economics professor (he himself a Marxist although I wasn't then, I was a "one nation" conservative until (a) I saw the light and (b) they joined the dark) in the 70s, the movement in the Phillips curve could be ascribed to a number of things. If you take the view (which you seem to, blaming unions for inflation) that we are talking about cost-push inflation, the cost of goods comes from four things, wages, dividends, overhead and materials. The cost of services comes from the first three. Unions sought fair reward for labour - and management in response jacked up their own wages and we see even today the effect of shareholder demands. If those had not been the management response there would have been no need for further worker demands. So it is just as plausible to blame cost-push inflation on management as labour.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 05:31 AM

Using Military Personnell to maintain EMERGENCY services is fine , but using them purely as strike Breakers is NOT !!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Musket
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 08:03 AM

By heck! A one nation conservative? and here's me, an ex socialist (before my balls dropped.) No wonder we agree on absolutely everything..

When the firemen went on strike, the old Green Goddesses were rolled out. Nothing new here. Holding the country to ransom in order to settle your own dispute is a bit '70s and sideburnish at the best of times.

Having armchair socialists rattling on about haves versus have nots doesn't help either. This is a dispute about the situation of fuel delivery people not a situation to exploit for far ranging political purposes, I got sick to the teeth with that rabble when I was on strike in '84. If they don't deliver fuel, someone else will and at least with the army, we are already paying their wages so perhaps cost effective to a degree.

I must go now, I'm working on inventing a time machine and once done, I will at my own cost, fuel availability allowing, transport it to Kent, as I am sure many will join in a whip round to get Richard such a present. Won't take long to build it, it only needs to work one way...

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 09:06 AM

The possibility of action by tanker drivers is in response to the big oil companies "outsourcing" deliveries to cowboy managements who are eroding safety standards for tanker drivers. The drivers are concerned for their safety in the face of cost cutting.
Who does that make "the bad boys"?
I think you will find that it is the managements of the respective companies.

in Pontefract, the Accident and Emergency department at he local hospital has been closing overnight since November because they have a shortage of emergency doctors. A proposal was made that, until they could find new permanent staff doctors, that it would be possible to "borrow" army medical staff to cover the shortfall. Negotiations were going well with the army until Cameron's gang got wind of the possibility. They immediately blocked the idea completely. We are not allowed to pay army doctors to save the lives of members of the public because it is a waste of taxpayers money.

Now - using the army to back up bad bosses - that's what they are there for...

Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Musket
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 09:17 AM

Not wanting to detract from your main point Geoff, but the Pontefract A&E is a little more complicated than that. In general at any NHS hospital, there are a few army, navy and RAF doctors working there, normally on registrar rotation in many specialties.

That isn't quite the same as "borrowing" teams, which can be a waste of taxpayer's money as in Pontefract's case The A&E was upgraded for political purposes by dint of the many Labour ex Ministers in your patch, and especially our Yvette... the trust knew of the issues of recruitment, the board had misgivings about the upgrade and the Strategic Health Authority had already spoken of centralising emergency care, as ambulances were already diverting to Pinderfields, Doncaster or Leeds for major trauma.

Cameron's gang didn't get wind of anything, they supported the PCTs and SHA in their regional commissioning plan for out of hours emergency care. This government have made lots of awful, sometimes dangerous political decisions about NHS care, but it would be wrong to pin this one on them. Cooper/Balls/Hinchcliffe strike again...

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 09:25 AM

We didn't need a new Private Finance Hospital in the first place. The old one was old but okay. Unfortunately Tony Blair's New Thatcherite Party sold the old buildings down the river and put the trust in big debt to pay for it - hence that can't afford doctors.

My point stands that Cameron thinks it is a crime to use army to help the ill, but the second someone has a legitimate industrial grievance that ought to be discussed, his response is (before any ballot has been held) to stand up like Thatcher and crow - "If you hold industrial action I will call in the Army to crush you!".
Sounds like Assad and Gadaffi to me!

Quack!
GtD.

Subject: RE: BS: Use of Forces to Deliver Fuel?
From: GUEST,pete from seven stars link
Date: 26 Mar 12 - 06:26 PM

gnu-speaking from experience as a former trucker i can assure you that a quite stringent test is required for a HGV licence.i understand that a further qualification is required to haul fuel and other hazardous loads.that is not to say that the profession is up among the highly trained jobs like doctors,lawyers etc but worthy of a little more respect than you seem to suggest.