Fuel 'Strike'
2005-09-16
So, once again, people with nothing better to do threaten to bring the country to a halt with 'strike action' aimed at voicing their discontent over the price of fuel. I wish people would stop calling it a strike, since I'm sure these people don't have a union and I doubt there has been any fair balloting, but still. Although to be fair, provided they're not physically preventing people from working, I suppose it's fair enough, in the same way that my sympathy for genuine strike action runs out the moment workers start bringing about unreasonable inconvenience or danger to the public.
But I digress. The point was that after all the warnings and the panic, only a handful of protesters turned out, and nothing much got stopped at all. So the petrol stations were fine, right?
Wrong.
I work in a fairly daft little town a few miles from the larger one where I live. The small town has only one petrol station, as best I can tell. On Monday there were lengthy queues (my car was due for refilling sometime in the early part of the week, so I did so at a supermarket garage close to my home). On Tuesday, there remained lengthy queues. By Wednesday, there were no queues, because the place had signs up pointing out that it was out of petrol.
Was it out of petrol because of the 'strike'? Not directly: it was out of petrol because people were panic buying. The town has a fair number of elderly and retired people, as well as those who live and work there and have a vehicle for the rare occasions that they needed to get out, so lots of vehicles that normally wouldn't be filled often, all just begging to be topped up in case the 'strike' went on for longer than the promised 3 days. And that's even without considering having cans of petrol on top of what the vehicle can hold.
So after a couple of days of panic - before the 'strike' had started, some proportion of the town (plus untold people from beyond its limits) had full tanks, and the others had less than that, perhaps much less, in a town with limited amenities including a doctor's surgery that a lot of people don't trust, a police station that is rarely open, no job centre and no hospital.
The worst part is that once a few people start the panic, everyone else is forced to join in. Once there is a danger of fuel running out - and even without the 'strike', panic buying makes that danger very real - even those who were not previously concerned need to get in there and make sure they are catered for. So inevitably some people will get there too late, and will become casualties of a situation that could have been avoided had those people with enough petrol to get through the planned three-day action (which, let's face it, was most of us) left it at that.
Actually, that isn't the worst part. The worst part is that I have no idea what should be done about it. All it takes is for a few media statements to give the impression that such a panic may come about, and it's a self-fulfilling prophecy as everyone fears that someone else will drain the pumps, and the race begins. Without unwieldy restrictions on who can do what (which are perhaps what is necessary), it can't be helped.
Rant over...
But I digress. The point was that after all the warnings and the panic, only a handful of protesters turned out, and nothing much got stopped at all. So the petrol stations were fine, right?
Wrong.
I work in a fairly daft little town a few miles from the larger one where I live. The small town has only one petrol station, as best I can tell. On Monday there were lengthy queues (my car was due for refilling sometime in the early part of the week, so I did so at a supermarket garage close to my home). On Tuesday, there remained lengthy queues. By Wednesday, there were no queues, because the place had signs up pointing out that it was out of petrol.
Was it out of petrol because of the 'strike'? Not directly: it was out of petrol because people were panic buying. The town has a fair number of elderly and retired people, as well as those who live and work there and have a vehicle for the rare occasions that they needed to get out, so lots of vehicles that normally wouldn't be filled often, all just begging to be topped up in case the 'strike' went on for longer than the promised 3 days. And that's even without considering having cans of petrol on top of what the vehicle can hold.
So after a couple of days of panic - before the 'strike' had started, some proportion of the town (plus untold people from beyond its limits) had full tanks, and the others had less than that, perhaps much less, in a town with limited amenities including a doctor's surgery that a lot of people don't trust, a police station that is rarely open, no job centre and no hospital.
The worst part is that once a few people start the panic, everyone else is forced to join in. Once there is a danger of fuel running out - and even without the 'strike', panic buying makes that danger very real - even those who were not previously concerned need to get in there and make sure they are catered for. So inevitably some people will get there too late, and will become casualties of a situation that could have been avoided had those people with enough petrol to get through the planned three-day action (which, let's face it, was most of us) left it at that.
Actually, that isn't the worst part. The worst part is that I have no idea what should be done about it. All it takes is for a few media statements to give the impression that such a panic may come about, and it's a self-fulfilling prophecy as everyone fears that someone else will drain the pumps, and the race begins. Without unwieldy restrictions on who can do what (which are perhaps what is necessary), it can't be helped.
Rant over...
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