Brace yourselves for a Christmas without all the usual goodies which you like to splash out to buy.

What on earth is happening? Are we in a war zone? Have we upset foreign powers so that they are blockading our shores?

Is there some attempt to starve the British people into submission over something or other?

It all beggars belief but here we are being told that there will be shortages of food and drink over Christmas, and the reason? Well, they cannot get the deliveries through because of blockages in the system, but primarily lorry drivers.

In recent years it has always been expected that a British shopper could get whatever he wanted from somewhere. Just place an order or may be just go into a shop and there it will be on the shelf. But that looks like changing because of the delivery difficulties and these include taking a lot of extra time to get from ports to shops so fresh food is already under threat. Supermarkets are saying that they will have to reduce the number of lines of goods just to ensure that the more important are still able to get to the shelves.

Perhaps the time has come for supply chains to re-think their methods. Perhaps the time has come to favour the white van man. There are plenty of white vans around and you do not need a special driving licence to use one. It will immediately be said that these vehicles are not suitable tor long-distance haulage but they are okay for short distances.

And of course we have the basic infrastructure on the railways to move far more goods by rail freight so why not send your large consignments on the railway and then distribute locally with your white vans?

Another option is to forget the special goodies, at least fresh ones. Buy them during the year in sealed containers when demand is different. Or just go without and settle for more mundane foods and drinks. Easier said than done!

There is a lot of criticism of conditions for long distance lorry drivers. Sitting in your cab all day and sleeping there as well is not a very attractive prospect and to boot having to settle for sandwiches and burgers rather than getting decent meals is yet another turn off. Britain is not a country which serves its long distance drivers well, unlike the continent of Europe. So it is a career which is not enticing new entrants at the moment.

There is no doubt that over the years the range of products available at our supermarkets has become quite stupendous but that heyday looks like suffering a serious blip and will it ever return? Probably the truth that getting what we want is not going to be so easy in future has not yet sunk in but that is another problem we seem to suffer in Britain – a lack of foresight until it is too late.

Is it Brexit? Is it the pandemic? Do we need to review our rules on who we allow into the country – letting in people who are prepared to do the work that our own people are not? Happily the number of lorry drivers has improved over recent months so keep your fingers crossed.

And just to conclude today’s report, the number of new cases of covid in the UK has increased to 43,676 which brings the seven day rollup now to 303,071, over 300,000 as predicted.

Adrian Leopard     24-11-21

Photo ja ma