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'Pastoral care' for eastern Europeans
Page 6
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A driver agency now offers a service to accommodate and teach eastern European drivers. David Harris reports.
A NEW-STYLE DRIVER recruitment company is planning to help drivers from eastern Europe who come to work for British hauliers by arranging "pastoral" care including skills assessment, language lessons and accommodation.
Tardiss, based in Wimbledon, will charge the firms employing the drivers a "margin" of £2 to £3 an hour on top of the drivers' wages to fund the scheme for around six months or as long as the pastoral care continues.
"We believe the big companies will pay this because they need the drivers and they find it harder to give each driver the individual attention they may need," says managing director Nick Miller. 'Our aim is to supplement the UK market of drivers and not to replace it with cheapies from eastern Europe.We only want the best and intend to pay them proper market rates,"says Miller.
The project to support the east European drivers comes against a background of continuing driver shortages in the UK, as well as fears over the standard of foreign drivers coming to work here.Tardiss hopes to set up a driver assessment centre in Poland as part of its screening process.
The help package is one part of the new service planned byTardiss to start at the beginning of May, to coincide with the expansion of the EU eastwards. Miller hopes that Tardiss will be able to cut the cost of recruiting a new driver from an average of £2,000 to £500.
However one UK driver expressed his concerns at the scheme. Davey Driver says: "The safety aspect of strangers to the UK's roads is frightening in my opinion. It's okay for the likes of the French where modern vehicles are used, but in places like Poland or the other countries joining the EU. they have a lot of old trucks on the road that were built back in the 60s when ABS was just a dream.
"Drivers of these old vehicles jumping behind the wheel of an Actros, for example, after only a little training, along with having to get used to new roads signs.driving on the other side of the road and so on cannot be a safe practice."