(Adds transport committee chair, details)
By Michael Holden
LONDON, Sept 25 (Reuters) - Britain is expected to announce
plans to issue temporary work visas to truck drivers to ease an
acute labour shortage that has led to fuel rationing at hundreds
of gas stations and long queues to fill up - with pumps running
dry in some places.
As retailers https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/britain-resolve-trucker-shortage-swiftly-minister-says-2021-09-24
warned of significant disruption in the run-up to Christmas,
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's office said it was looking at
temporary measures to address the shortage of heavy goods
vehicle (HGV) drivers.
Newspapers reported that the government would allow up to
5,000 foreign drivers into Britain on short-term visas, a
measure that logistics companies and retailers have demanded for
months but which the government had previously ruled out.
The UK's Road Haulage Association (RHA) says Britain needs
100,000 more drivers if it is to meet demand.
Shortages of truckers have been caused partly by Brexit and
COVID-19, which put a stop to driver training and testing for
about a year.
"We're looking at temporary measures to avoid any immediate
problems, but any measures we introduce will be very strictly
time limited," a spokeswoman for Johnson's Downing Street office
said in a statement.
Downing Street declined to give further details.
Ministers have cautioned against panic buying, and oil
companies say there is no shortage of supplies, merely problems
delivering the fuel to gas stations.
However, there were long lines of vehicles at filling
stations as motorists rushed out to fill up, and some forecourts
closed as their supplies ran out.
The issue came to the fore after BP said it had to
close some of its outlets due to the driver shortages, with
Shell and ExxonMobil's Esso also reporting
problems with supplies.
EG Group, which runs 341 forecourts across Britain, said on
Friday it would impose a purchase limit of 30 pounds ($41) per
customer for fuel due to the "unprecedented customer demand".
"I regret what we're seeing at the forecourt," Huw Merriman,
chairman of parliament's transport committee, told BBC TV.
"I was out on my bike ... and came past my BP garage and it
was chaos. As soon as the message gets out there might be a fuel
shortage, people understandably react."
One police force said long queues were a potential hazard,
blocking roads for emergency vehicles.
Downing Street said the country had "ample fuel stocks".
"The public should be reassured there are no shortages," the
spokeswoman said. "But like countries around the world we are
suffering from a temporary COVID-related shortage of drivers
needed to move supplies around the country."
The fuel issue comes as Britain, the world's fifth-largest
economy, also grapples with a spike in European natural gas
costs causing soaring energy prices and a potential food supply
crunch.
Other countries across Europe as well as the United States
are also dealing with truck driver shortages, and industry
figures have warned there was no guarantee that a change to the
visa process would see foreign drivers coming to Britain.
"We'll have to see if we can attract people for a short
period of time," Merriman said.
Britain says the long-term solution is for more British
drivers to be hired, with the RHA saying better pay and
conditions are needed to attract people into the industry.
But retailers have warned that unless the government acts to
address the shortage in the next 10 days, then significant
disruption is inevitable in the run-up to Christmas.
($1 = 0.7311 pounds)
(Reporting by Michael Holden and Guy Faulconbridge
Editing by Frances Kerry and Helen Popper)
