More broadly, I have no objection to my government spending money for something that will benefit the economy. They're best placed to do it because they can take advantage of huge economies of scale and we clearly all benefit from it (solving supply chain issues, increased taxation). This is exactly what government should be doing.

Sorry mate, the best we can offer at present is PPE contracts for friends of family of ministers.

I know that margins for brokering a PPE contract at the height of the insanity was 10%+, so you could retire on a single reasonable sized contract.

You seem to be assuming that all HGV drivers are employed via Agencies. They aren’t.

I am fully aware of IR35 and the way it was used to justify paying drivers lower wages. It was always a stretch to suggest that HGV drivers qualified under IR35 and the ways in which that was promoted and used over the years saw many changes. None of them particularly convincing against the fundamental requirements.
If you spoke to the drivers in the age range that appears to have abandoned the job you’d learn that they didn’t want to be using tax dodges to get paid a decent wage. They felt coerced into doing so, or that they had been misled into doing so. Some of the ‘umbrella/composite’ companies would have agencies sign up drivers by using phrases like ‘it’s our payroll company’ or similar. Normalising a deceit that was far closer to tax evasion than avoidance.

The government didn’t break it, they didn’t even have to change a law. They just applied the law as it had always stood.


Btw, the Agency Workers Directive enshrined a right to holiday pay for temporary workers. It also delivers equity of pay and conditions including sick pay after a specified period of continued work.

I think it's their job to plan for crises - preferably to avoid them happening but otherwise to mitigate them as much as is reasonable given other constraints.

I appreciate some have a different political view.

So for you, in terms of commercial activity like food distribution, the state should be involved where?
How about for supplies of milkshakes to fast food outlets?

Now you're being silly.

Definitely involved in food distribution crises planning. I'd expect part of the planning in the event of a serious pandemic, for example, to cover emergency food distribution. Also, if there was a reason to expect a systemic problem even without a pandemic/etc type event then sure of course government needs to get involved.

Doesn't sound very important. A diet coke shortage - absolutely, now were talking crises.

Meh. Food distribution crisis is overstating what has been happening lately. Is anyone starving for want of food in the shops? Nope. Food poverty may be happening, but it’s not as a result of distribution issues. (This IS an area that government should be acting on)
The fuel problems had the potential to overspill and government stepped in. (I still want to know who paid for that.)
If the food issue gets worse then no doubt there will be an intervention. Should it get worse? No, because private enterprise should deal with it.

We’ve come a long way from my initial rebuttal of the idea that Brexit caused the driver shortage. I assume that you’ve accepted that idea is now suitably rebutted.

Can we agree government should be involved when there's a serious problem? Whether there is a serious problem or not follows after agreeing the principle.

Addressing it is the priority. Beyind addressing it, we can consider why it happened and how to better avoid it in future. I wouldn't claim to be an expert on precise causes of shortage of HGV drivers but what we do know is that it hasn't come out of the blue so it could have been mitigated much more.

Dominic Cummings (remember him?) is now offering Labour his advice on how to defeat Johnson:

Hadn't seen that but I expect his advice to be both more effective and preferable to that given by Campbell, Mandleson, blair etc

Which is quite the sad state of affairs.

Cummings is quite correct that Labour has sold its soul to 'graduate loons' and become a voter-repellent.



Unfortunately his solution is to replace Starmer with Nandy, who aggressively argues that male rapists should be put in women's prisons so they can carry on raping at their leisure throughout their sentences, and we're already in the insane position where women prisoners get their sentences lengthened if they ever refer to one of these men as 'he'.

If there were two options, one where Nandy replaces Starmer and the other where she's run over by a bus, you would have to favour the bus scenario.

I would assume the tax payer; who else could it be really?

I hear my queen spent a night in the hospital. This is very sad stuff. When she passes I will mourn with fireworks and bbq. It will be a sad day, I'm Canadian she is my queen and we all mourn in our own ways

The companies whose fuel got delivered? Seems pretty obvious to me.

Oh you mean they rented the army drivers out? Yes that could be.

I think you just have to let it run its course now. Letting the country go to **** is likely the only way brexiters see the error of their ways.

Or at least that's what I thought. It is somewhat concerning that they continue to buy the company line as fed to them by the govt. and right wing gutter press. It's early days though, they're still deferring inbound checks, they're kicking the NI protocol down the road and there has yet to be a winter of true discontent. And let's face it, surely there's only so long they can hide behind covid given our world beating vaccination program, right?

Thankfully I'm going back to Thailand in December, but I do wish you all the best of luck over the winter period. This wasn't your fault, don't let them forget that.

We can agree on the principle, but I prefer a ‘don’t panic’ approach to involvement. Government should act with a light touch.

We can agree that the driver shortage was predictable, but disagree about whose responsibility it is to do something about it.

Kathleen Stock: University of Sussex free speech row professor quits

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It is a good job they didn't go for a don't panic/light touch approach with furlough as we'd be properly ****ed if they did.

Would we? Yeah, probably.

I accept that you are correct in your assertion that furlough saved us, but was that panic, or a measured and prompt response to a clear crisis situation?

They probably didn't have much choice. It was not, however, "light touch". In the same way that bailing out the banks was not "light touch" either. But both were IMO absolutely necessary, and therefore the government should not always act with a light touch.

Uggh, how terrible.

Incidentally, Bari Weiss had Julie Bindel on her podcast this week discussing these very issues and they touched on Professor Stock's situation. It's well worth a listen.

Women Like Hunting Witches, Too

You’ve highlighted two major, global issues that led to a need for significant government intervention. That doesn’t negate the need for a light touch to be the underlying philosophy for government.