Tory Transport Secretary Grant Shapps has been slated for claiming there is “plenty of fuel” – as panic buyers left more than half of the UK’s petrol stations empty.
The surge at forecourts for a third day caused “really serious problems”, according to the Petrol Retailers Association (PRA).
It comes as the SNP and Scottish Labour slated the Tory Government over their handling of the crisis, which the PRA says could last up to 10 days.
Despite Shapps’ claims of “plenty of fuel”, he said he was sending out an SOS letters to one million HGV licence holders begging them to get back behind the wheel.
And Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng last night suspended competition rules which stop fuel suppliers talking to each other so they “could work together more effectively to ensure disruption is minimised”.
But the SNP yesterday said the Tories’ plan to ease the chaos at the country’s petrol pumps was “too little, too late”.
Nats immigration spokesperson Anne McLaughlin MP said: “Three days of queues at filling stations and the Tories come up with a plan that is grossly inadequate.
“They can try to deny this is a crisis but a crisis is what it is and it requires far more substantive action than the insufficient measures so far.
“It will do next to nothing to address the multiple labour shortages causing serious damage to other areas of the economy, like Scotland’s vital food and drinks sector.
“Even during this deepening catastrophe, the Tories’ inability to provide a proportionate response is driven by their disastrous hard Brexit dogma. This is not a solution, it’s a classic case of too little, too late.”
Labour leader Keir Starmer accused the Government of a “lack of planning”, adding: “I’m astonished the Government, knowing the situation, is not acting today.”
Monica Lennon, Scottish Labour spokeswoman for Net Zero, Energy and Transport, said drivers’ desperation was triggered by their lack of faith in the Tories.
She said: “If drivers queuing for hours at the pumps and forecourts running out of fuel altogether isn’t a crisis, then what is?”
“The public are panicking because they have no confidence in this chaotic Tory government.
“We depend on HGV drivers to transport vital food and fuel supplies to communities. The UK Government must take responsibility and act before this crisis becomes a catastrophe.”
Brian Madderson, chairman of the PRA, said the UK Government was “loathe to recognise” that supplies were stuck at refineries or storage depots and were not being delivered to forecourts due to current supply issues.
Madderson told the BBC the creation of 5000 HGV foreign driver visas, announced by the Government on Saturday, was unlikely to alleviate pressures in the “ultra-short term”.
He said: “We might see benefits of them later in the autumn as the drivers come across and start to work, but in the very short term this panic buying has caused really serious problems.” he said.
“I’ve talked to a lot of our members. They serve the main roads, the rural areas, the urban roads, and anywhere in between 50 and 90 per cent of their forecourts are dry, and those that aren’t dry are partly dry and running out soon.”
With motorway pumps running low, the outgoing association chairman said oil companies were “giving motorway service areas priority delivery”, resulting in drivers “flocking” on to the nation’s major highways to fill up.
He added: “One of them mentioned to me that yesterday they had a 500 per cent increase in demand compared to a week ago, which is quite extraordinary.”
Scottish Lib Dems Wendy Chamberlain MP said: “The Conservatives have repeatedly ignored calls from businesses to address the shortage of drivers. It is a bit rich for ministers to now blame the public and the road haulage industry for the mess we find ourselves in.
"This fuel crisis is the Conservative party reaping what it sowed and the British public paying the price."
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