British grocery chains recently warned the government that unless a labor shortage caused by the Brexit is addressed, we could see headline that say 'Christmas is canceled' because shelves will be empty and there may be no turkey or minced pies.
Groceries have now been joined by others in the British retail industry who say that unless the labor shortage is addressed in the next two weeks, it will lead to empty shelves across the holiday season.
Even the British fuel industry is literally running out of gas.
BP had to close some of its gas stations due to the driver shortages while queues formed at some Shell stations as pumps ran dry in some places. ExxonMobil's Esso said a small number of its 200 Tesco Alliance retail sites had also been impacted in some way. read more
In a rush to fill up, drivers also queued at some gas stations in London and the southern English county of Kent. Diesel ran out at one station visited by Reuters. [...]
"Unless new drivers are found in the next 10 days, it is inevitable that we will see significant disruption in the run-up to Christmas," said Andrew Opie, director of food & sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, the retail industry's lobby group.
The next 10 days are crucial because retailers ramp up supplies in October to ensure there are enough goods for the peak Christmas season.
Can you imagine imperiling your entire economy because you didn't like the way drivers from the mainland looked?
We don't have to imagine too hard because we've done the same to ourselves here in America to a broader extent. American industries are facing labor shortages and empty shelves too and it's not just because of a resurgence of the coronavirus. The Biden administration is also struggling to unwind the Trump regime's 4-year-long assault on immigration that's exacerbating a labor shortage in a similar fashion to Britain's Brexit.
It's not much a stretch to hypothesizes that if Trump had been reelected, our Christmas would have been canceled too. And as much as I am critical of Boris Johnson's government, I recognize that we're plenty capable of making our own mistakes.