OK, this isn't funny any more. Where's the army?

[Orangejuicemarathoner]

One quarter of staff and students late to school this morning, and 10% didn't get there at all. It has been announced that, excepting physical disability, any student within 4 miles or adult within 6 miles will be expected to walk in, but Its expected to be worse tomorrow with a good chance we will be closed by Wednesday.

AA reporting over 100 "incidents" on the road within a 10 mile radius of the school - mostly roads blocked, and mostly by queues outside petrol stations.

I struggled to get home by bike, because of the chaos on the roads - I got off my bike and walked several miles of it.

I called in at a supermarket on the way home. The shelves were more than three quarters empty. No bread or milk. So I'm sitting here drinking black tea planning rice for dinner instead of cheese on toast.

I know its not a catastrophe that I spent an extra hour getting home, and dont have milk in my tea, but what is that saying about the state we are in?

AIBU to say the army should be called in. What have we got an army for? Surely, an organisation of thousands of fit, capable, organised individuals, with vehicles and capacity and skills in logistics is exactly what we need to be utilised in this situation right here right now.

PS, is it ok to feed dog food to cats? does anyone know?

You can feed dog food to cats but not vice versa. Cat food tends to contain more protein so can be harmful to dogs kidneys

Yep...welcome to Brexit Broken Britain. Got rid of all the 'unwanted' for the Little Englanders, but funny ol' thing, we actually need them after all!

And agree its not all down to daft buggers panic buying...I'm in the South and its getting harder and harder to get to the shop in time for bread and milk (never had that problem before) and cat and kitten food. I just hope those who voted for this cr*p suffer most, because I certainly didn't!

It’ll be gone. Most panic era have a full tank by now and a few canisters in the garage. Now the rest of us will be able to get fuel when req’d.
It’s getting better already.

Found petrol today after running very low but didn’t go out of my way to find it. Waited out the crazies at the weekend and got on way home. No issues with food here either

Where on earth are you lot living??

@IvySneezes

I don’t know where you live but petrol stations are stocked here and shops too. Is this scaremongering just as bad as the fake news that started the run on petrol?

Not where we live! haven't been able to get petrol since Friday as the queues are utterly insane.

We need the army but only to patrol the queues and bitch slap anyone with more than a 1/4 tank of fuel

@Orangejuicemarathoner

so yes, I do think that calling in the army is justified. We have an army to protect our society.

We don’t actually. We have armed forces to defend our country. Not the same thing at all.

Why are people panicking? We have plenty petrol in Scotland and the supermarkets are not missing much on the shelves. But we haven't been daft...Maybe because we don't believe much that Boris and his cronies in government say. And the BBC up here know better than to scarwminfer because we will call them out.

What are the army going to do? They are mostly slightly crap at driving HGVs, and as far as I'm aware don't run farms that can privately provide food to shops.

The bring in the army quote isnt aimed at the whole blooming army but at the Royal Logistics Corp ,their whole job is to drive and are trained in HGV .I know cos we have a member in family .Many also have their hazmat ,so they can deliver petrol so they are the perfect fill ins

North West Kent/London pretty awful with petrol. My husband had to go, by ambulance, to hospital today. It took the ambulance ages to get here, despite being priority, snd then nearly two hours to get him to our hospital, usually 20 minutes away. The roads are so gridlocked with queuing, that nothing, even emergency vehicles can get through properly. I don’t know about supermarkets as home deliveries have had goods missing, but most stuff arriving. Not good enough, and the government need to come up with a plan, not just deny a problem.

re the cats - cats can eat dog food, but dogs can't eat cat food. Just for future ref. Don't panic buy all the dog food!

@Carriecakes80

Yep...welcome to Brexit Broken Britain. Got rid of all the 'unwanted' for the Little Englanders, but funny ol' thing, we actually need them after all!

And agree its not all down to daft buggers panic buying...I'm in the South and its getting harder and harder to get to the shop in time for bread and milk (never had that problem before) and cat and kitten food. I just hope those who voted for this cr*p suffer most, because I certainly didn't!

Nice. Wishing hardship on others. It’s always Remain voters that are most vitriolic I notice, despite thinking that Leave votes are thick, rascists amongst other things.

I’m south east. Portsmouth has massive queues apparently. Chichester has intermittent queues in the big Tesco’s. The other one has small queues but has run out a few times that I’ve been past.

My own town has three petrol stations. Two have no fuel and the third has been blocking up town all day.
I’ve still managed to get a full tank with only a short wait at a different supermarket just the road.
So yes it’s really daft here,

No fuel in my town. Only petrol in the next. We are slap bang between two cities and both are struggling fuel wise. I’m getting nervous as I have to be in Leeds on Friday and unless I can get some fuel somewhere I’m stuffed. I’m not overly worried about food. I’ve previously overbought so have a freezer full. It may not be ideal, but we won’t starve. And piss off with walking 6 miles! Fortunately I work 20 miles away….

Hgv drivers have been saying how bad working conditions are. So we expect WU drivers to come here and our up with long hours and shitty conditions.
I hope the EU workers tell them to get stuffed. Why should we think its ok for them to be exploited?

I think the news and media are to blame for this panic. They gleefully reported the predictions of fuel shortages on itv news at 10 and yes everyone rushed out to fill up.

@Dadvdtret

re the cats - cats can eat dog food, but dogs can't eat cat food. Just for future ref. Don't panic buy all the dog food!

Our dog loves cat food, sometimes it’s all she’ll eat. It doesn’t seem to have done her any harm.

I'm panicking. I haven't queued yet, but I'm down to less than 1/4 tank. I got the train to work today, (added 90 mins to my travel time) and will tomorrow, and I'm teaching remotely on Thursday. Hoping that by Friday, everything will have calmed down.

@lannistunut

Welcome to Brexit Britain, nothing quite works anymore.

Expect the people who voted for it are moaning loudest too.

They can't get the army in to do this in Scotland as they are already helping with ambulances aren't they? Everything is breaking.

For gods sake no.

Look I voted remain and have never been as angry as when the Brexit mob won, but this is a much bigger issue and cannot be attributed solely to Brexit.

The lorry driver shortages of 100,000 have been reported by the transport industry’s for years since the government made the qualification process more difficult and legislation more complex. The driver workforce has been ageing one for many years.

Covid meant lots of drivers either aged out and with no more tests being conducted to replace them there was a natural shortfall. In addition Covid and Brexit meant some drivers went home never to be replaced.

But let’s be clear here, this is not as a sole and direct Brexit result.

This is very identifying but our family are haulage, from HGV drivers to Operations Director of a massive logistics company. This is from the horses mouth.

There is enough fuel, there are enough drivers to keep us in food and fuel, but the greedy, panicking neurotic bastards are making a non issue an issue just like the toilet roll. Only 1% of petrol stations have closed. That’s 1 in 100 by you and me that has had to temporarily close. Normally you wouldn’t even notice.

Yes we have some reduced lines in the store because of this driver shortage, I don’t deny it, but not enough for it to be a life threatening crisis and this will get resolved, although not straight away.

What we need is idiots to be sensible and not selfish and to look At the wider picture (beyond Facebook) not scream Breeeexxxxxit at every turn.

I would still vote remain BTW but FFS get a Grip.

We don't have a petrol problem, we have an idiot problem.

I had a Tesco delivery today, there was only one thing substituted and the driver said they had petrol kept back for the delivery vans. They expected it to all calm down by the end of the week

Aren't you enjoying the fruits of Brexit. This is what we voted for.

@Bumblenums1234

We don't have a petrol problem, we have an idiot problem.

Agreed, 52% at the last count.

What we need is to look at fuel gauges on all cars in the queues- more than half a tank full & queuing--fine them

No fuel at our local station until Friday. The next nearest is 8 miles away and reports of queues every day, I can’t risk the journey and not be able to get fuel. We live in a rural area, you have to drive as there is no public transport unless you count the bus that only runs 4 times a day from a bus stop two miles walk away and doesn’t stop anywhere near the school or the station to get to work. I have enough fuel to do the school run until Thursday if they don’t sort it out by then then I simply won’t be able to take them to school. Fortunately work isn’t affected because we can still work from home. If they can get the army up to speed on delivering the fuel I definitely think they should bring them in!