Leaving the car at home and using public transport looked futile last night as bus companies stopped night services, diesel trains were cancelled, London Underground drivers struggled to get to work and taxis in the north began to charge double rates.
Stagecoach spokesman Barry Gardner said 75% of buses nationwide had enough fuel to run normal services until Friday. After that, less popular routes outside 8am to 6pm would have to be cancelled.
The worst hit were buses in the north-west and Wales. The Stagecoach bus depot in Chadderton, greater Manchester, yesterday ran out of fuel as did three other bus depots in Bolton, Wigan, and Glossop, Derbyshire. Bullocks bus company suspended all services in Cheshire and south Manchester between 10am and 3pm, while callers to BBC Greater Manchester Radio complained that taxis in the area were charging double rates.
In Gwent, Wales, around 50% of Stagecoach buses were cancelled and 30% of services stopped in Cheltenham and Gloucester.
From tomorrow, rural areas in Cumbria and Suffolk could become cut off outside rush hour.
Electric trams in Blackpool and Manchester were taking extra passengers and in Merseyside electric trains were preparing to run extra services.
But two-thirds of the national train network runs on diesel fuel and the Association of Train Operating Companies said yesterday that companies only had enough to last until Friday.
South West Trains began cancelling services yesterday, terminating its London Waterloo to Paignton, south Devon, service around 30 miles short at Exeter. This was likely to be repeated today.
The Brighton to Reading service was being terminated at Basingstoke.
Railtrack had to call in extra staff to control crowds at peak hour times, and some train companies reported a 50% increase in passengers.
Railtrack has brought in extra beds at key locations so that staff can sleep between shifts. Diesel fuel supplies a considerable part of the rural network so train operating companies in these areas will be the first to suffer when supplies dry up.
Meanwhile, the British Airports Authority yesterday advised airlines to refuel at Heathrow or Gatwick airports, which have so far been unaffected because they have private pipelines for fuel. East Midlands, Luton and Liverpool airports asked airlines such as Easy Jet to refuel abroad and enter Britain with enough for a round trip.
Angelique Chrisafis and Keith Harper
Health service
The Department of Health warned last night that the fuel blockade was putting the NHS under "massive pressure" as people who could not get home visits by GPs and district nurses turned up at hospitals' accident and emergency departments. Many ambulance crews were answering emergency calls only.
A spokesman blamed the crisis for the cancellation of dozens of operations yesterday. "There is no doubt that the longer the blockades continue, the more chance there is of lives being put at risk," he said.
"GPs and district nurses are not able to visit elderly and vulnerable people in their own homes. Ambulances have cancelled non-emergency journeys and NHS staff are having great problems getting to work in many areas.
"This means that operations are now being cancelled and A&E departments are coming under more pressure as people cannot call out doctors easily."
The department said NHS blood stocks were reasonably high, but fuel shortages were hindering the collection of newly donated blood in some parts of the country. "Blood supplies are being moved around the country causing delays to deliveries. Vital hospital supplies - including medicines - are beginning to run low in some places," the spokesman said.
NHS managers were working to find emergency fuel supplies and pool meagre resources. Emergency planning teams, normally only used to ease pressures in the health service during the winter, were being set up to deal with the crisis.
Some local health authorities were issuing doctors, nurses and other health workers with special certificates to allow them to access emergency fuel supplies.
Protesters yesterday allowed fuel supplies earmarked for local ambulance services through the noose round refineries at Stanlow in Cheshire and Grangemouth, near Edinburgh, as well as distribution depots in Ipswich and Leeds.
Motorway garages also introduced a guaranteed supply system for emergency services, including all 42 sites run by Granada. London's big hospitals also held a joint meeting to draw up emergency plans to pool fuel for back-up generators if the crisis deepened, while routine operations were cancelled in mid-Wales and Staffordshire ambulances imposed a 55mph limit on non-urgent callouts.
John Carvel and Martin Wainwright
Supermarkets and shops
Some shops and supermarkets have seen customers clearing the shelves of bread, milk, flour and sugar as panic buying has shifted from petrol to groceries.
Although supermarkets assured customers they had enough fuel for food deliveries for the foreseeable future, this actually meant up to the weekend, according to the British Retail Consortium.
Drivers at the frozen food company Iceland claimed they would not be able to make food deliveries after tomorrow.
Tim Mason, marketing director at Tesco, said yesterday that ultimately fresh food supplies would be affected by the fuel crisis. However, a company spokeswoman said there had been no evidence of panic buying.
Staff at shops and supermarkets in the West Country have witnessed panic buying of fresh and dried milk, bread and flour. Pat Bint, acting manageress of Londis in South Cerney, near Cirencester, sold out of bread and milk within 90 minutes of the shop opening yesterday.
Sales at Somerfield's supermarket at Malmesbury, Wiltshire, had increased by 7% over the last four days. Shelves were being cleared of bread, milk, eggs and sugar, according to store manager Stuart Yeandel.
Roy Litchfield, treasurer of the National Association of Shopkeepers, warned that commerce could grind to a halt because of the shortage of fuel. He said the impact could be felt by shopkeepers within the next five to seven days. "It is really going to start to bite in the next few days. How are they supposed to get food to people if there is no petrol and there are no buses to transport people into towns and cities?"
Helen Carter
Business
The Confederation of British Industry yesterday warned that the country's hard-pressed manufacturing sector would start shutting down production lines today because of the fuel crisis.
The motor industry, food processing and steel manufacturing were running out of raw materials, had fuel shortages or had nowhere to store the goods which could not be delivered.
Service industries were finding difficulty getting out to see clients and workers in rural areas without public transport could not get to work.
A CBI spokesperson said: "It does look serious but some sectors are worse hit than others."
Transport companies saw their shares take a battering on the stock market as companies such as P&O, Hays and Excel were marked down by City pessimists.
A spokesman for P&O, which delivers containers and other goods from Tilbury and Southampton docks, said the crisis "is beginning to impede the flow of goods around the country."
Virgin said its megastores could run out of CDs and mobile phones within two weeks if they could not be restocked.
The Energy Intensive Users Group, which represents steelmakers and papermakers, said: "We have seen gas prices rise by 50% this year already and have been having a private fuel crisis which is only just registering with politicians now."
Terry Macalister
Local services
Local authorities have begun suspending non-essential public services amid mounting concern that the continued blockade of refineries and oil depots could soon start to force school closures in some parts of Britain.
Council leaders urged ministers to ensure that any emergency powers were used to direct fuel resources to priority areas such as fire services, refuse collection and care services for the elderly and other vulnerable people.
Emergency plans have already been drawn up by councils to eke out dwindling fuel stocks by dropping non-essential services such as mobile libraries, grass cutting and street cleaning.
In Devon, as in other rural areas, bus operators are being advised not to take children to school unless they know they have enough fuel for the return journey.
In Somerset, three rural primary schools will be closed today because staff are unable to get there. Free schoool meals for 10,000 children have been suspended and hundreds of pupils will miss school because some bus companies have run out of fuel.
In Leeds, 1,300 children at 11 special schools have been told their bus service may stop. In Essex, 44 pupils at De La Salle secondary school in Basildon woke up to be told their school bus would not be running. In Nottingham, two private bus companies providing school transport are running out of fuel.
Geoff Gibbs
Tourism
Tourist operators in rural areas said yesterday they were facing a disastrous collapse in bookings unless the fuel crisis was resolved in the next few days.
Chris Collier, chief executive of the Cumbria tourist board, said scores of small businesses were likely to fold as holidaymakers rushed to cancel bookings in the Lake District, amid fears that they would become stranded without petrol.
She said the tourist board had been inundated by calls from worried hoteliers, including the owner of a bed and breakfast who reported taking cancellations worth £2,500 in the space of a morning.
"The situation is extremely serious for Cumbria," she said. "September and October are traditionally our busiest months, and 95% of our visitors come by car."
One hotelier in Ambleside said he had lost £1,400 in cancelled bookings in 24 hours. Michael Fletcher, owner of the Nanny Brow country house hotel on Windermere, said he had only a week's supply of fuel oil left to heat the 18-bedroom hotel, and had asked guests to ration the number of baths they take. "We have quite a lot of staff here and we have to run the place whether we have 25 guests or 10 guests. If we're still in the same situation next week it will start to bite very hard indeed," he said.
Simon Bradley, the head of operations at South-west Tourism, said the situation was "very serious" for the economies of Devon and Cornwall. "We depend heavily on tourism in this region - in some areas it is the major employer," he said. "Undoubtedly, visitors are deciding not to come and that makes it absolutely crucial that this situation is resolved. September is a critical month." One major tourist operator in the south-west said it was laying on accomodation at rock bottom prices in case holidaymakers were stranded without enough fuel to travel home.
News of the fuel crisis is beginning to affect bookings from overseas, the British Tourist Authority said, with holidaymakers and business travellers thinking twice about coming to Britain while the shortages continue.
