Obviously people are panicking about fuel shortages if there is a strike by tanker drivers..
This hasn't been helped by Government ministers telling people to keep a full tank and also to store petrol in their garages to help avoid strike disruption.
The effect of such statements on public behaviour is so easy to predict that one can't help but wonder why the Government didn't foresee it. You'd have to be really stupid not to work out that suggesting the possibility of fuel shortages increases the likelihood of panic-buying, wouldn't you?
I'm no fan of the Government but I find it just a little hard to believe that anyone could really be that stupid. Surely at least one civil servant would have made the obvious connection and told someone...
Which then makes you wonder if it wasn't deliberate. Get everyone really riled up, start the panic, see a few petrol stations run out of petrol because of the unusual demand, closed petrol stations fuel (sorry!) the panic and then the general public start screaming at the Government to send in the troops to cross the picket lines. This then undermines the bargaining power of the unions in the future. After all, if it's ok to break this strike, why not the next one?
Incidentally, the price of petrol has gone up even more. It's currently at £1.40 per litre. That's approximately 2.24 US dollars. A litre is 0.26 US gallons. So 1 US gallon of petrol is about 3.79 litres and it costs £5.31 or 8.45 US dollars...
Just saying...
Not stupid? You could have fooled me. What about the notion of "same-sex marriage"?
ReplyDeleteI worked it out years ago, when I suddenly realised that every holiday period or every run-up to an Election of some sort, things began to happen:
ReplyDeletePower workers would go on strike;
Transport workers would go on strike;
Postal workers would go on strike.
Therefore, every person in the country was adversely affected.
Easy. Wind up the voters. Election coming up. They won't vote for. . .
Unfortunately it appears some poor lady has set herself on fire decanting petrol between canisters in her kitchen.
ReplyDeleteFrancis Maude is being blamed.
With the greatest of respect, though I think he was rather daft to issue this advice - the public were even more daft to follow it! My car is currently on the red - it was far too nice a day to be queuing in hot sunshine for petrol yesterday, although needs must today...
If one were really cynical, one might note that panic buying of petrol increased the Treasury's take very dramatically, at a time when that would help massage economic performance figures. Fortunately, my innocent mind doesn't work in such devious ways.
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US gas is averaging a little under 4 bucks a gallon right now, enough to even start ticking off the most stupid of Democrats who voted for O'bowmao to start muttering about him. the jerk is on record as saying he'd like to see US gas prices as high as the ones in Europe. Gas at $8.45 would be enough for even the Secret Service men to turn on the boy-dictator wannabe.
ReplyDelete[A US gallon, btw, is 4/5ths of an imperial gallon. -- the US uses 16 oz. per pint, not 20.]