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It is a paradox of human society that rational conduct at the individual level can be highly irrational at the collective one. Thus perfectly reasonable decisions by individual lorry drivers

to leave their jobs create unexpected labour shortages in the haulage industry. This in turn creates localised supply problems, magnified by the media into a serious petrol and diesel

shortage. This leads to a national fuel crisis, as queues form at the pumps and drivers all attempt to fill up simultaneously. By now it is too late for official appeals to affect individual

behaviour, as the psychology of panic buying dictates that any sense of civic duty is overridden by the imperative of _sauve qui peut. _ It is easy to say that the Government ought to have

foreseen all this and intervened much earlier to nip the crisis in the bud. If ministers are distrusted when they reassure the public that there is no fuel shortage, however, there is not a

lot they can do. Talk of “sending in the Army” merely persuades those who had previously dismissed reports of a burgeoning dearth of supplies that there really is one. The primeval “fight or

flight” instinct, normally held in check by ratiocination, can suddenly take over. Like the Gadarene swine, people rush to the nearest petrol station, find themselves in mile-long queues,

then get into disputes or even fist-fights over priority. En route home with my 89-year-old mother after a funeral yesterday, I was grateful when I was finally able to hail a London taxi

driver. “I hope you aren’t going far,” he said dolefully. “I’ve barely got enough diesel to get myself home and I don’t know when I’ll get any more.” Home for him was Sutton, twelve miles

south of central London. Luckily we weren’t far away, but as he dropped us he said with a shake of his head: “I won’t be going to work tomorrow.” This taxi driver is certainly not alone —

indeed he must be one of millions whose work and daily lives are now being disrupted. Hence the indirect effects of the artificial shortages caused by panic buying are probably more damaging

than the direct ones. If the fuel crisis continues for any length of time, it could slow down the post-pandemic recovery of the economy. Even more seriously, the impact on health and other

emergency services is probably already costing lives. There are demands for essential workers to be given priority for what fuel is available. This is easier said than done, though it has

happened on previous occasions, most recently the fuel crisis of 2000. As for the Army: it was deployed in the 1953 petrol strike to ensure that supplies got through. Compared to those days

of National Service, however, the armed forces have only a small number of troops to deploy: at most a few hundred of them. Even the 5,000 visas being issued to tempt drivers from the

Continent are unlikely to have a major impact, at least in the short-term. The only thing that will bring this unnecessary crisis to an immediate end is for the whole country to resist the

temptation to give in to the “every man for himself” impulse. During the early stages of the pandemic, there was panic buying of household supplies, but it quickly subsided once such

behaviour became the target of ridicule and contempt. The power of social disapproval is far greater than any sanctions at the Government’s disposal. It might be distasteful to name and

shame the people who defy warnings to give emergency workers priority or who follow tankers from their depots, but it would have an immediate effect. Nobody wants to be identified as a panic

buyer, still less to be ostracised by their neighbours. A week is a long time in a crisis of this kind. There is every reason to believe that in the next few days good sense will prevail.

Once things return to normal, however, there must be an urgent inquiry into what went wrong. Is Brexit to blame, as Olaf Scholz, Angela Merkel’s putative successor, and many Britons who

supported Remain claim? (No doubt the Prime Minister will be grateful for the German Finance Minister’s historical _obiter dicta_, but a reduction in red tape at the Channel ports would be

of rather more practical use.) Are the problems in supply chains that we and other countries are experiencing a delayed side-effect of the pandemic? Or is the lack of lorry drivers a

phenomenon of globalisation, with multiple and complex causes? Whatever the answers, we need them fast. A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are the only publication that’s committed to covering

every angle. We have an important contribution to make, one that’s needed now more than ever, and we need your help to continue publishing throughout the pandemic. So please, make a

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