Faced with a supply-chain squeeze that’s increased prices across the economy, the U.K. government is seeking to recast the crisis as a good news story for British workers.
It’s the beginning of October, just the start of what the retail world simply calls “peak.” But the industry is already in various forms of panic that usually don’t take hold until the weeks before Christmas.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he won’t fall back on immigration to solve the U.K.’s truck driver shortage, as he presented supply chain troubles that have left supermarket shelves bare and gas stations dry as a “period of adjustment” in the wake of Brexit and the pandemic.
China’s current energy crisis can be traced back in part to a legal amendment targeting miners that garnered little notice when it went into effect in March.
The U.K. wants to issue visas for truckers to ease a shortage that’s led to gasoline stations running dry and hit food supply chains. The hard part could be persuading drivers from eastern Europe, the biggest pool of labor in recent years, to come back.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson is under increasing pressure to do more to ease a supply chain crisis in Britain after pumps ran dry at some gasoline stations because of panic buying.