“Despite the billions of pounds in profits enjoyed by many oil companies,”

Hmm, they usually lose money on refining and distribution you know. Shell certainly did last year…..

@1

[Citation needed]

I think the health and safety angle is a bit of a red herring myself. I’ve got an HGV licience, but not the ADR certificate that allows you to drive a petrol tanker.
If I got the cert I’d be deemed safe to do so. What’s the problem?

By all means fight for your wages and working conditions, but no need to exaggerate.

Re Shell refining profits.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16849659

“Despite improved profits, the company said it had been hit by falling refining margins across the industry.

Oil prices during the quarter were more than 20% higher than a year earlier.

However that was partially offset by a loss of $278m on its downstream operations, which includes its refining and petrol stations businesses. “

Hmm, they usually lose money on refining and distribution you know.

They’re horizontally and vertically spread companies. Just because one part loses some money doesn’t mean they don’t earn billions from oil. Non-sequitur

Good article, though this:

“Unlike some other recent strikes, the potential strike by Unite drivers has clear moral and social merit”

Seemed like an unnecessary dig. No need to give ground to Conservative narratives to strengthen your own.

@3

Reading the article on Left Foot Forward tells us of a tanker driver who used to be a Bus driver and who had half a day’s training.

Not a nice thought for someone in charge of 7,000 gallons of flammable liquid hurtling along our roads at 50mph+, is it?

>Reading the article on Left Foot Forward tells us of a tanker driver
> who used to be a Bus driver and who had half a day’s training.

> Not a nice thought for someone in charge of 7,000 gallons
> of flammable liquid hurtling along our roads at 50mph+, is it?

I’m not sure I follow you.

Are you saying that a driver responsible day in day out for the safety of 50 to 100 passengers would be lacking in driving skills? Or that carrying passengers carries with it a lower duty of care?

Your glib and off the cuff statement doesn’t bear closer examination.

@7, when your driving along at 50mph in your petrol tanker, the thing is just not to crash.
There’s not much extra special driving skills that can be taught to have you not crash the thing. Just don’t crash it. It’s the same really for driving any truck. Don’t crash, don’t hit things. Look out for cyclists etc.

If they really are handing out the ADR certs that easily I might go and get one myself.
You just have to know how to fill the tanker safely, and know how to do what you need to do at the petrol station end. I’m sure it’s not rocket science.

Are there two L’s in bollocks?

I have started a blog which includes the full version of this article http://abettercapitalism.blogspot.co.uk/

“They’re horizontally and vertically spread companies. Just because one part loses some money doesn’t mean they don’t earn billions from oil. Non-sequitur”

That is interesting. So if they were separate companies then the argument wouldn’t work, right? Because all the money is being made over here, in this company which does the drilling, the extraction, while the money is being lost over here, in the company that loses cash doing the distribution?

So if the oil companies were not vertically integrated then the drivers, not being part of the vertically integrated company, would not have a claim on the vertically integrated profits.

I do have that right, do I Sunny? That is your argument? Because the drivers work for a vertically integrated company then they have a claim on the profits of that vertically integrated company, but not on the profits or losses of the specific part that they work for? Yes?

“but about the practices of the contractors used by big oil companies such as Shell and Esso to transport petrol to forecourts. It is these contracted companies that employ the tanker drivers. ”

From the OpEd: they are not vertically integrated and thus do not have a claim on the profits of the entire chain.

Your turn Sunny.

Workers never strike for a laugh, or for a day off. They lose too much money. They strike because they are genuinely aggrieved. They work very long hours and the work is vital, and could be dangerous if they are rushed or corners are cut.

The right to to withdraw one’s labour in a free society is a fundamental right! Those who oppose this are facists and those who disagree with these rights are apologists of facism, and, those who oppose that tanker drivers’ rights to strike are stupid apologists of rampant capitalism that seeks to reduce workers’ right everywhere. Are you so fucking stupid or so well off that you can denigate any working class person who has to defend their living standards? Your so called interlectual shit makes me sick!

@12 – You’ve made two very different claims.

That the oil companies are not making a profit from shipping fuel around the country. This is true.

That the contractors companies the oil companies are hiring to do the shipping are not making a profit. This is false.

How many times does the wrong fuel be put into the wrong tank for this to be an issue? This has already happened. Fortunately, there have been no fatal accidents yet, but this is a time bomb…

Just to be clear: any driver who drives a tanker will be a qualified HGV driver.
So this idea of a bus driver with half a day’s training is far from reality. The bus licence and the truck licence are two totally different licences, and to get the sniff of a tanker job you’d have to have a pretty good CV in Heavy Goods Vehicle driving, plus have all certificates to do with handling fuel.

That doesn’t mean that the companies are not trying to cut corners and bring in cheaper and less experienced drivers – I’m sure they are, because tanker drivers are top of the wage scale – and many drivers driving similar vehicles ,,,, but with non-hazardous goods, are earning a lot less.

As for the driver’s working long hours. The tacograph and the driver’s rules to do with hours are very very strict. You can’t go two minutes over your allowed driving or working time without the transport manager noticing it. And you will get pulled up for it.

I would still support the drivers though. Lets all have £35,000 a year wages.

@1 Tim worstall

”Hmm, they usually lose money on refining and distribution you know. Shell certainly did last year”
Exactly why they want to cut corners put road safety at risk.

These companies operate on an acceptable risk policy. They will have calculated their financial loss due to increased accidents when they increase the pressure on drivers to improve productivity. Probably an increase of a couple of chances in a million.

The bus and train companies do it too.

Its the risk assessment culture of transport- happy with that are you- increased deaths on the road due to oil companies trying to reduce losses in this dept.

Of course they do not factor in the cost to the taxpayer.

@3 damon

”I think the health and safety angle is a bit of a red herring myself. I’ve got an HGV licience, but not the ADR certificate that allows you to drive a petrol tanker.
If I got the cert I’d be deemed safe to do so. What’s the problem?”

I have a PCV and as you well know the real test is your driving record. To drive the tankers you have to demonstrate a low accident rate- accident rates vary from driver to driver so it must be due to driving ability;

The companies want to reduce the onerously ( in their view) requirement of a low accident rate by employing less experienced drivers. Not good for anyone who drives.
Not good for the taxpayer who will have to fund the investigation into the increased fatality and serious injury rate.

Tanker drivers currently a very low a cident rate

There’s a more detailed discussion of the issues here. Worth a read.

http://www.leftfootforward.org/2012/03/fuel-strike-dispute-view-from-drivers-cab/

@18 tigerdarwin

I would say the actual driving is not the issue. That it’s the loading and unloading of the fuel where the difference lies. Just driving the vehicle on the road is not the hazardous bit.
Of course it is potentially if there was to be an accident in which the fuel ignite, but accidents can happen to anyone. I think if you start saying that you actually need six, seven or ten years normal HGV driving behind you before you can be considered for a tanker, then that might really just be about the existing guys trying to protect their jobs – and the big pay differential they have with guys just driving regular loads.

If it was all about the potential crash and a fuel explosion causing mass death, then what about your common bus driver going along with 70 passengers on board? They too could crash at any moment, and there are many times more buses on the road.
They could even crash into a petrol tanker.

The difference with the tankers is how they handle the fuel. Maybe they are cutting corners on that training – I really don’t know. But I do know that the health and safety industry is bloated with a lot of bullshit too. Of course drivers need to know what they are doing with the fuel.
Is the argument really that they don’t always?
Or is that just the argument which helps them win their case with the public better?

”If it was all about the potential crash and a fuel explosion causing mass death, then what about your common bus driver going along with 70 passengers on board?”

I couldn’t agree more . In the post privatisation period bus casualties went up, I drove one for a living

However bus companies operate an acceptable risk policy, normally paying out around 2 million per death. They have tightened up recently and those with poor driving records are forced out of the trade.

Having said that there are still too many serious injuries on bus travel,rather more than can be attributed to tankers. Indeed the Health and Safety culture on buses has improved and is used to get rid of poor drivers.

Your argument is therefore self defeating for H and S on buses is still not good enough, far worse than the tanker equivelant. The petrol companies want to go to where the bus companies are now, not good enough.

Sorry, what are these ‘recent strikes’ without ‘moral or social merit’?

Disappointed to find such comments on Liberal Conspiracy – particularly when it comes off as a bit of special pleading via pandering to the ‘they’re holding the country to ransom’ crowd.

21. tigerdarwin

I don’t really have a problem with trying to look after the interests and improve the lot of truck drivers. It’s what I do myself and the wages are shocking unless you have found yourself a good little position somewhere, and maybe being a unionised tanker driver is as good as it gets. So sure, speak up the issues of safety – like the RMT does for it’s train drivers. Even London black taxi drivers have been joining the RMT because they like the way Bob Crow sticks up for his members.
But having been in the industry I think I can detect a bit of BS too. I’m not against that if it works, but on this website it comes across as just more lefty spinning.

Making it harder for people to become bus drivers and truck drivers on the grounds of safety might be a good tactick to maintain good pay and conditions, but it’s also a bit dishonest IMO. Of course a guy who crashes, or sheds their load or makes some mistakes in their job should be re-assessed, but I can’t see how you really make it work – as how are you going to get people coming into the industry if you are errecting barriers and it becomes a bit of a closed shop?

I felt the frustration with that when I went for some tipper jobs, and even though I’d been doing shop deliveries in an articulated lorry, all the tippers wanted to know was had you done tippers before. I hadn’t so they wouldn’t give me a job. Class 2 ridgid tippers. ”How f**king hard is it to drive one of them?” I thought as they gave me the brush off. An artic is far more of a skilled job than a poxy tipper, but that was it – no job.

As for bus drivers, you train a bus driver, they pass their PSV test, and then what?
Do you not let them drive the coach or bus? Because they don’t have the experience.

”As for bus drivers, you train a bus driver, they pass their PSV test, and then what?
Do you not let them drive the coach or bus? Because they don’t have the experience.”

Yes actually. Many companies require two years driving experience, with a good accident record. The better the job the higher the standards.

” I hadn’t so they wouldn’t give me a job. Class 2 ridgid ”

probably insurance

24 and 25.

So how does anyone ever start off in a job? And it’s a bit of a bizarre discussion for a website like LC to be having if this was the crux of it.
When you pass your bus or coach licence, there is a time when you will be going out on the road with passengers without experience of doing so. The first time.

How else could you become a bus or coach driver?
I think it’s a bit of a nonsense thing for people from outside the industry to be arguing really, in the way it was set out in the first post.
Next you’ll be having teachers asking for all the less skilled teachers to be kept out of the job.

The handling fuel training cannnot be skimped on, but the actual driving bit is not the issue IMO. I could easily and safely drive a petrol tanker the same way I drive a regular unit and trailer. It’s the fuel bit I’d have to be trained in. And have a few years experience on the road of course. But this is just another of those not well worked out LC threads.

”So how does anyone ever start off in a job”

hold on a minute _ i worked for a major bus company for five years.

The bus companies train their own drivers as do many lorry firms. You sign a contract to work for them for one or two years or pay a fee.

Many of the big companies self insure, that is why they indulge in acceptable risk.
Thus if a bus driver kills someone the company pays out.

The other advantage of self training is that the company has a real understanding of your driving skill, rather than just a licence.

If you pay for your own PCV or HGV in can be difficult to get into the industry.

I do not agree this is poorly worked out, I think many of the comments are relevant.

The driving is an issue . It is the increased productivity being asked buy the companies i.e. driving faster that is an issue.

tigerdarwin – then maybe I should say that it’s a hard thing to explain to the wider public very easily. I don’t really understand all that’s been said and I’ve been working as a truck driver.
I’m probably the kind of person that they want kept out. I’ve never been on the books proper for a big employer, but have floated around as an agency driver mostly.
And how some of the regular drivers at the big companies don’t rate the agency drivers – unless you stay for some time and get to be considered ”alright”.
Some of the regular drivers treat their truck as almost their own personal property, even though they only use it for one shift. Family photos stuck on the sun visor, air fresheners, and sometimes someone with an obvious cleanliness obsession, with the Mr Sheen and the dusters left very conspicuously down the side of the door.
That was at Superdrug in Croydon, and some of those guys really resented anyone else driving their truck. They were on salaries and had pensions I think.
I understand why they are hostile to ever more casualisation. And safety may well come into it, but it would be good to hear management refuting that. I’m sure that they insist that safety is not scrimped on. A tanker blowing up is not something they are going want to be happening.
Out on the road, you can have the safest drivers in the world, but are still surrounded by the general public in their vehicles, so you can only be as safe as the worst driver on the road if you’re unlucky.

It would be good to be able to sign on with a bus company like you say and get trained up. Does it even happen anymore in the UK?

”It would be good to be able to sign on with a bus company like you say and get trained up. Does it even happen anymore in the UK?”#

All the big companies do it, First, Stagecoach, Arriva, a number of lorry companies would take you on as a trainee if you like as well even though you have a liocence.

These days the bus cos train you in automatics so it harder to leave though.