Finding times tough right now in transport? Let’s look out for each other, gaffers included!

Mental health. This is what this one is about. No, wait come back, we're being serious here, give's a chance.

Yes an article on mental health!

But I wanted to read about Fodens and such...

It seems like the working population of the country is going through a communal, negative mental health experience. Some people are at crisis point, some are wondering if they're getting close to it, others are beginning to struggle to project an image of normality as 'things' continue to get harder and there's a lot of folk with a feeling of despair, feelings of pessimism about the future that over-ride optimism they've never had before. It's hard not to get political and we'll try to avoid it as much as possible here, but much of it's surely down to the vast increase in the cost of living from tax to energy to fuel and food.

We all know from visiting supermarkets, the price of all sorts of items seems to increase every couple of months and it's no longer 5p here 10p there, it's 50p, GBP1 and you're probably getting less as everything shrinks. You have to work harder and harder to break even and if you work too hard the tax man will have a field day with you. Where does it end?

We're not going to see the prices of anything come back down again, even if it did get cheaper to make. If you want a tip: the cheapest possible item of actual food you can buy, as far as we are aware, is supermarket own brand rice pudding, a can costs 29p right now. The branded stuff is often over GBP2 a can.

Mental. Hauliers have been hammered with price increases on trucks, trailers, parts and consumables and to top it off the Government increased employer's National Insurance contributions, so the more they pay us, the more they have to pay the Gov. All we have here is the same message you've probably heard many times before: Look out for each other, check if your mates are feeling okay, tell someone if you aren't.

If you're a small haulier, talk to your drivers and find out how things are with them. Many guys aren't seen through the course of a week and we all know lorry drivers will bottle things up, issues physical or mental for as long as they possibly can, either because they're embarrassed, worried or hate to make a fuss. Hey it's alright to say "I'm really feeling the strain this week because of A B C etc"

There has been a lot of progress, from the success of Breaker Breaker which was established by Leanne Lyons in 2019 after she lost her lorry driver husband David to his battle with mental health (even there they really need to work hard to raise the sponsorship money to run their annual show, perhaps an indicator of how tight things are) to the promotion of groups like Andy's Man Club, CALM - the Campaign Against Living Miserably and even unofficial resources like driver WhatsApp groups can be great for support. While drivers might not communicate in person like they once did in Truckstop diners, there's still plenty of ways we can and do talk to each other. If you need some help for your messed up head, debt, relationship problems, work related stress, there are resources out there - you CAN get help.

SHOUT OUT TO THE GOOD GAFFERS Now we'd like to give a shout out to, and a thank you to, the good bosses - you'll know who we mean. These guys can have the world on their shoulders right now with all the uncertainty in transport, with contract tenders, fears of undercutting (which NEVER pays off), staying compliant and having the responsibility of finding work to pay wages that pay mortgages and rent and put food on tables.

It's never easy in transport, but this decade has been one hell of a grind. There're some rotten, selfish bosses out there but there's plenty of good ones and few folks ever offer them thanks for what they do and the sacrifices they make. For most independent small hauliers, everything is really tight right now due to the rising cost of everything from tyres to soap for the toilets and there's difficult financial decisions to make.

It's disappointing to hear stories of drivers throwing a strop because they're being asked to drive something they consider beneath them, or they're not getting the specification of truck they wanted. During some of the dark days of the early '80s recession there would be multiple drivers jump at the chance of work in some old day cab British wreck with a Gardner in it, just to be out working and earning. New trucks have become exorbitantly expensive, and we've often not appreciated just how fortunate we are to be driving such vehicles.

The entitlement attitude some have developed could really do with coming to an end.

Old Stralis pic from the archive we haven't used

We know of one guy who needed a truck in a hurry after one was in a non-fault accident and the insurance was taking forever. He had picked up a rare bargain, a last-of-the-line Iveco Stralis 570XP, a rocket of a thing with every option including an air con pod. Low miles, a fraction (like one tenth) of the price of a new truck, but the name Stralis is perceived as unfashionable. "As soon as the word Stralis was mentioned that was the end of the conversation. 'I'm not driving that'...

But it's not one of those plain white ones, this is top of the range, drives like a dr... It was useless, wages, conditions, didn't matter. In the end I contract hired in a unit and I drive 'the Wolf' myself - it's brilliant, by the way.

I didn't want to have to have that extra outgoing at this point but I needed a driver and a truck on the road to cover the work." A lot of high spec tractor units are now well in excess of GBP160,000 and as lovely as they are, they're increasingly out of reach at this point in time. Maybe it's time to be a bit flexible, if a clean used truck turns up in the yard with a few hundred thousand km on it but everything works on it and has what you need, what's so bad about driving that for a while?

Ultimately it looks like the UK is in for an unsettled and difficult few years. But we're Brits - or English, Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish, Scouse, however you want it - and we will get through it like we always have done. We all need to look out for each other, and that includes the gaffers.

Many never turn their phones off, they've got a hundred and one worries on their mind, the livelihoods of often dozens of people resting on their shoulders and agonising over decisions and calculated risks they sometimes have to make. But they'll rarely share their worries or burden, why worry the drivers they've got enough to deal with. We've sadly seen too many firms call in the receivers in the post-Covid era, and some still running today will have come closer to running out of road than you would dare to imagine; with houses re-mortgaged and cars, trucks, tractors and other items of sentimental value sold because some big expenses have come up or some big payment hasn't come through.

We'll get through it folks. Appreciate your colleagues, your gaffer and the work that goes into getting you loads to deliver, thank the forklift driver and compliment him on his loading if he's done a good job, or the mechanic if he's got that bloody warning light turned off - it might just make their day. And remember, if you're skint and starving, own brand rice pudding 29p.

Can't beat it.