The data of the British truckers crisis: the increase in wages does not compensate the damages of the covid and Brexit

For months, the lack of truckers in the United Kingdom has hurt the country’s economy. Although long lines at gas stations and empty shelves have been reduced after weeks of acute crisis, the situation is far from being fully resolved. And the industry association, Logistics UK, presented a report on Monday detailing the origin of the problem: the collapse of almost a quarter in the total number of truckers in the country, due to a mixture of the pandemic and Brexit. A situation that the sharp rise in wages in recent months has not been able to resolve.

The data is very worrying for the British Government. In two years, between the second quarter of 2019 and 2021, the country has lost 23.4% of its truckers: from 308,000 to 236,000. But the flight of Europeans in the middle of Brexit stands out especially: 34.7% of community drivers who lived on the island crossed the English Channel to return to the mainland. In total, 13,000 of the 39,000 who worked there.

Despite the suspicion that the drop in the number of truckers was due to early retirements due to the pandemic, the reality is that there have been more young people than old people among those who have left the sector. The average age of truckers has risen three years, from 47.9 to 50.8, indicating that there is no generational renewal. And all this despite the rise in income: the average pay per hour worked, gross, rose 7.8%, exceeding the accumulated inflation of these two years. And the association indicates that preliminary data for the third quarter suggest that the increase has accelerated and already exceeds 10%.

As if that were not enough, the pandemic disrupted the training of new drivers just when it was most needed: in the two quarters impacted by the lockdowns -spring 2020 and winter 2020-2021-, fewer than 500 people got their driving licenses. vehicles, compared to 7,000 in a normal quarter, further slowing down renewal.

Shock plan

In response, the government has offered £ 34.5 million to train new drivers on an accelerated basis, as many companies are unable – or unwilling – to train their own workers. According to Rona Hunnisett, Head of Communication at Logistics UK, the problem is that the large number of SMEs in the sector do not have enough money to invest in training, and those that do fear that the employees who have trained will end up signing for the competition shortly after , given the war to rob truckers from each other.

Logistics UK says that preliminary data from the end of 2021 indicate that the training of new drivers is accelerating, although the figures are still far from what is necessary to stabilize the distribution of goods across the country. And they trust that the investments of the State will serve to accelerate the recovery.

The silver lining is that the Christmas holidays have passed without large supply holes, as feared. Companies’ “plans B” to fill their inventories have been enough to avoid a major crisis. Still, according to a YouGov survey, 56% of Britons have personally suffered from a shortage of some essentials in recent weeks. A situation much worse than that of the rest of the continent: despite the fact that there is also a shortage of truckers, this level of shortage has only affected just 7% of Spaniards or 16% of Swedes. The big question is whether this will be the “new normal” until all the trucks that have been empty have a driver again.