UK Fuel Crisis: British Army to Drive Tankers
As the UK's fuel crisis continues, the military has put 150 drivers on standby to deliver fuel to service stations.
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PM Boris Johnson has made his first comments after days of chaos and panic buying
In a bid to assuage fears amid the UK's fuel crisis, and after days of silence, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the situation was “stabilizing,” telling motorists to go about their lives “in the normal way” after days of chaos and panic buying.
Motorists across the island country are still dealing with long queues at service stations amid a shortage of drivers, despite Johnson saying that the situation was improving.
Meanwhile, Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng confirmed that soldiers will be mobilized in order to resolve the crisis.
We are now seeing signs that the situation at the pumps has begun to improve with more stations getting more fuel.
— Kwasi Kwarteng (@KwasiKwarteng) September 29, 2021
The sooner we can all return to our normal buying habits, the sooner the situation will return to normal (2/2) https://t.co/KJaFgXRsnu
The UK government had put the army on standby in case the crisis worsened. 150 soldiers who were mobilized to help boost supplies may need an extra three days of training before the tankers can begin distribution.
However, as the government is still in need to fill thousands of vacancies needed in the HGV driver shortage, with the government doing a full U-turn on rules for overseas workers, and introducing a three-month visa plan to bring 5,000 additional foreign HGV drivers into the country to fill the gap.
Industry figures revealed this would not resolve the issue and argued that the problems plaguing the fuel sector will exist in the long term, possibly taking months before it is solved.
