I was talking to our heating engineer yesterday and he said that he was working on a building site when word went around that some wood had arrived at the local stockist. To a man, all the chippies downed tools and jumped in their vans.

Seems that wood may not grow on trees after all.

Friends of mine that own a small manufacturing company have seen the price of MDF jump by 40%

Mild winter in Scandinavia stopped them logging in a lot of the boggy ground can't see that being down to brexit.

I had to take my third choice on some veneered boards recently. Supplier had had orders placed but factory could not say when it would be fulfilled or even what would be on the next boat.

Similar problems getting some paints and cement.

Containers are also still in short supply which is pushing up the price, my cousin is waiting to move back from Singapore but delayed 6weeks waiting for an available container.

There is a big increase in demand, was on site yesterday and all the scaffolding was new, the reason was there is so much building work going on the scaffolders have all there existing poles and boards already on jobs so are having to buy more. Does not help if the job drags on while waiting for other building materials.

Edited By JasonB on 11/06/2021 07:11:38

We all know there's TONS of dirt cheap stuff out there from the previous 10 years

and its not the suppliers who are stopping stuff arriving

So the supply problem isn't outside the UK or there would be a global shortage

Northern Ireland has food shortages which is absolutely ridiculous

and it definitely isn't the food suppliers who will be holding up the flow of free trade

Look closer to home, to the people who control these flows

People who magically get 100% wages and pensions no matter how bad things get and cry "we were only obeying orders!" when they get called out on the mess they make of things

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No good blaming border controls. That's what we voted for. If you want no border controls, then lobby your MP to re-enter the EU.

There is currently the perfect storm, Brexit border controls, Covid, possibly still the backlog from canal being blocked and from what I've read, the shortage of containers. A lot of our cheap labour, including vast numbers of HGV drivers, has gone back home to the east of Europe as well which won't help.

Nobody voted for morons to run the border

The previous 20 years proved that they are totally irrelevant to the inflows of trade and goods and the last 6 months proves beyond any doubt that they are a massive liability for a country trying to get going in the global market

Steel prices are now on a day by day quote, held for 24Hrs. I was talking to my local supplier, he told me to order today as it may be gone next day. As for buying copper wire, best not ask the price unless sitting down with ambulance pre booked ! Noel

The shortage of materials, parts and finished goods isn't due to the border controls. The well-known company I work for which makes agricultural machinery has huge problems getting parts and materials we have over 80 million pounds of part finished machines waiting for parts, constant daily shortages resulting in production delays.

The border controls have added a day to the logistic pipeline which means adding a day to the lead time before the part is needed on the production line which hasn’t been a big problem. Finished goods into EU and parts out of EU has settled down to almost normal. We have registered as an AEO which allows unrestricted import of parts to us, which effectively makes us the border point for our parts.

The problem is getting parts and materials due to the months of backlog in supplier’s inventory due to Covid, this is around the world not just EU or UK. The whole pipeline from raw material to finished parts emptied out and have yet to fill, manufacturers have been reluctant step up production not knowing if more disruption is on the way, who wants to hold expensive stock if the market collapses as it did last year.

We stopped early on in the pandemic last March for 5 weeks, restarting at the beginning of May ’20 and haven’t stopped since, our order books are full, and production speed is up, the only thing holding us back is parts & material supply, and believe me we are prepared to pay the increased cost to secure supply.

This is a big business problem the plant I work in, which is one of 69 around the world, turns over nearly £1 Billion per year on its own, so the price we are prepared to pay to keep producing drives up the prices across the board.

To the argumentative bunch I know what I'm talking about, I’ve spent the last 15 months trying to keep a major UK factory going and in profit, you would not believe the amount spent in this effort.

Edited By Juddy on 11/06/2021 10:12:57

Edited By Juddy on 11/06/2021 10:13:23

You are wrong if you are trying to blame this on a single factor. It's a lot of factors all at the same time including firms buying whatever they can when they see it. (Just like the bog rolls).

regards Martin

If I had the time I would try to find out what happened economically in 1919 and 1920. I know that the world went into a very severe recession during the period (possibly worse than ten years later). It may be relevant.

The world had just come out of a war, there was a pandemic and major political unrest. Because of that the commodity markets were in a mess. I believe the highest gain in value of any commodity, ever, was rice on the Tokyo market. The price crashed a few days later.

I don't have the time, the workshop calls. I must use up all my metal and then I can buy more when the prices cash.

JA

I started watching this the other day but got bored part way in! Let me know how it ends.