Rather than allowing this discussion to get lost in a totally unrelated thread, I thought I'd move it to it's own dedicated thread. Some forum software allows posts to be moved to a new thread but if it can be done on this one, I can't see how, hence the multiple quotes.

Gilbertd wrote:

I've been using P&O for years and have a season ticket (fixed, cheap price, irrespective of time of year, school holidays, etc) with 3 return Dover-Calais crossings left on it. In the last year or so they have removed the restaurants so you could no longer get a proper meal on the crossing and other things that suggested they were cutting costs. Going over to Paris in the morning and was going to call them to book it against my season ticket when the news broke. They are advising people with a P&O booking to go to the DFDS check in so figured that would be booked solid and almost certainly delayed so I checked the price with Irish Ferries who have been running a Dover-Calais service since last year and have booked with them. Cheaper than DFDS and only slightly more than my pre-paid season ticket would have been but shouldn't be any problems. P&O are saying they will be back up and running in 7-10 days but I very much doubt it, I suspect they are dead and gone and even if they aren't, they will be very soon. If I can get a refund on the unused crossings on my season ticket, I'll just use that to buy a DFDS season ticket or an Irish ferries one (if they do one). I too won't be using P&O ever again either.

Lpgc wrote:

It's a bit alarming to hear about P&O, I don't know all the ins and outs but on first consideration it doesn't seem legal re UK employment law what they're doing. I also see this as likely the end of P&O. Not that it's really relevant or an important factor but I have to wonder if this could also have minor impact on my business, because if people wonder about being able to get their LPG converted vehicle abroad in future (and since they can't take their LPG vehicles through the Chunnel) there's the possibility a minority of customers could be put off LPG conversion.

BrianH wrote:

The ferries generally aren't a problem - Stenna Line say nothing about LPG and I've used them multiple times, Irish Ferries or DFDS (one of them can't remember which) Just say something about it needing to be shut off when on the ferry (Can't remember exact wording, but it didn't seem like they wanted you to manually operate the shutoff on the tank, and not something they could easily check). The impression I got at the time was that if the gas was shut off when the ignition was off then this was good enough (so the electronic valve would do this).

May be different on the routes to Europe rather than Ireland, but it didn't seem to be a problem. Might have changed in the last few years as its been a while since I've been out that way.

I can't see P&O surviving this, it seems a desperation measure as they would be forced to try and compete on price to attract any custom. Seems odd they removed the restaurants as my experience of them is theres very little to actually do on the ferry whilst your crossing and it seems an easy money maker. Though I guess a 90 minute crossing is a bit different to a 4 or 8 hour one to Ireland depending where your going from/to.

nigelbb wrote:

All the ferry companies are OK with LPG conversions. It's only the channel tunnel that won't take them as they aren't licensed to take them. Apparently as LPG wasn't a big thing when they were designing the tunnel they didn't get carrying LPG powered vehicles signed off as safe & now it's too much hassle & expense for them to get it done. Maybe after the P&O debacle they might open to some lobbying. If we travel Dover->Calais we always use the tunnel as it's so much simpler & a little quicker never mind nicer during winter weather. Our place is in Brittany so we always prefer to use Brittany Ferries especially the Portsmouth->Saint-Malo route. It's a 12 hour overnight trip but you get a good night's sleep & then it's under 1.5 hours drive to our cottage whereas if we go via Calais it's a six hour drive.

I too will never use P&O & agree that they will go out of business They have misjudged the outrage their actions have caused

As most of you know I regularly use the Dover-Calais route (only got back in the early hours of this morning) and for a number of years I have been using P&O season tickets which were good value. You buy a block of crossings, 3 returns, 5 returns, etc at a fixed price, so the price is the same irrespective of whether it is school holidays, bank holidays, etc which would normally push the price up. It is also fully flexible so you get on the next crossing irrespective of what crossing you are actually booked on. I've often been asked why I don't use the tunnel as it is quicker but, ignoring for the moment the fact that I'm running on LPG and they don't allow LPG powered vehicles, while the actual crossing time may be quicker, overall there isn't a lot to choose. Loading takes longer, unloading takes much longer and apart from anything else, it is boring sitting in your car, in a train, in a tunnel with nothing to look at for the crossing time. My other, and main reason, is that while the tunnel may be better if you are just nipping over to Calais for a booze cruise, if you've got any distance to drive once the other side of the Channel, you're going to have to stop for food at some point. So why not use the ferry where you can sit in a restaurant, browse the duty free shop, sit down and relax in one of the lounges (unless there's half a dozen coachloads of schoolkids on a school trip) and generally relax out of the car? There was nothing better than a P&O full English to set you up for the drive ahead of you.

The P&O ferries used to have the Food Court, a cafeteria style restaurant with a choice of 4 or 5 meals in the afternoon and evening or various breakfast options in the mornings, and the Brasserie, a waitress service, a la carte restaurant that, while a bit more expensive, was excellent. With the Covid restrictions on travel, changes were made over a period due to the much lower level of tourist traffic. When restrictions started to be relaxed around September 2020, the Brasserie was closed and rather than having the food pre-cooked in the Food Court, it would be cooked to order. By August 2021, the Food Court was closed but tourist passengers were allowed to use the Routemasters restaurant that normally would only be open for freight drivers. Food was, if anything, better quality and cheaper than the Food Court (full English and a mug of coffee for a fiver). By December last year, the Brasserie had been removed and the Food Court renamed the Food Market with a choice of pre-packed sandwiches or, the only hot options, a soggy panini or probably the worst pizza I have ever had. Non freight passengers were no longer allowed to use the Routemasters either, so no proper food. They had however, opened the Club Lounge (taking the space that used to be occupied by the Brasserie), an extra cost option but with unlimited food and drink. Tried it in January and while it was very nice and comfortable, with help yourself tea, coffee, beer, spirits, etc the only hot food options were a bacon roll or the aforementioned panini or pizza. This despite the kitchen that had formerly been used by the Brasserie was still there, just not being used. When I spoke to the staff, they didn't think it a good idea at all and while there weren't too many tourists travelling at the time, once restrictions were lifted then things should return to normal. Although I was told that the staff that used to run the restaurants had already been made redundant so reinstating things wouldn't be as simple as just opening up the doors.

It seems obvious to me that the Dubai based owners don't understand how the ferries work. Yes, probably all operators have been running at a loss while they have had to rely on the freight traffic but give it another couple of weeks and tourist traffic will almost certainly return to the previous levels. The other operators, DFDS and Irish Ferries, who took over the Dover-Calais route in June last year after Sea France stopped running on the route (although they never really got started from what I could see), will now reap the benefits of P&O disappearing as I very much doubt they will be back. Even if they do come back in 7-10 days as they are saying, I suspect hardly anyone will risk using them in the future. If anyone is prepared to risk P&O they will only do it once after they discover they can no longer get something to eat and have to resort to French motorway services instead. Driving into the port at Calais last night, the overhead signs simply said "P&O, No Departures", not what you want to see if you've been away for a few days and not been keeping up with the news,

I had intended using one of the 3 remaining crossings on my season ticket to go over yesterday but the announcement came before I had called them to confirm the crossing times. DFDS are taking passengers that had booked with P&O so I figured they might be busy and, as I had a pretty tight schedule, couldn't afford any delays. Irish Ferries were about £30 cheaper than DFDS too so gave them a try. The ship, the Isle of Inishmore, was more luxurious than any of the P&O ships, all the restaurants were working (and busy), the only downside being the crossings aren't as regular as the others due to them only having 2 ships doing the crossing. Just got to see if I can get a refund on the unused crossings on my P&O season ticket now......

So, what are DFDS ferries like? I'm pondering a trip via Dover/Calais this summer if the wars stop, pandemics lift and fuel prices fall!

Not used DFDS for a few years but they used to be very good. As they also do a similar season ticket scheme to that offered by P&O at a similar price but it includes a meal, I'll be giving them a try next time and, unless there's anything I don't particularly like, will be getting a DFDS season ticket. The only downside is that while their crossings are regular, not all are Dover-Calais, some of Dover-Dunkirk. DFDS introduced a couple of new ferries a few years ago which, at the time were the biggest on the route and I used them a few times. Only when P&O introduced their Spirit of Britain and Spirit of France ferries did they loose the biggest on the Channel title. Although considering Spirit of Britain, along with the smaller Pride of Canterbury and Pride of Kent, is tied up in Dover harbour, Pride of Burgundy is tied up in Dunkirk and Spirit of France is halfway through a refit in Rotterdam, none are going anywhere at the moment.

When I checked for yesterday an outbound around 09:00 with the return at 22:00, DFDS wanted £155 while Irish Ferries was £124. The only pandemic restrictions now, assuming fully jabbed and boosted, are that the French want a signed declaration that you don't have any symptoms and haven't knowingly contacted anyone who is positive in the last week and proof of vaccination status. In saying that, I handed my passport and declaration to the French Immigration lady on my way out and she gave me the declaration back and only wanted to see my vac status on my phone from the NHS app. No restrictions at all coming back, not even the dreaded passenger locator form. Can't predict anything on wars or fuel prices though, my crystal ball isn't that good......

I was watching todays news on TV [ Monday] and I see that P&O [DP World] are considering hiring Indian staff at £1.20 - £2.00 an hour. Because they have the ships registered in Cyprus they can get away with these pay rates. If Johnson and his bunch of cowboys had any balls they would ban P&O from any UK ports. I am not in favour of the old days of ferry crews going on strike whenever they felt like it, but everybody is entitled to be paid a decent living wage.

I do think that, with leaving the EU, Johnson is trying to break payscale agreements and bring the UK back to the 1970's when hard working people were paid pennies while the greedy fatcats earn multi-million wage packets along with disgustingly large bonuses. Just to show fair DP World are to their workers they have sacked all the UK based staff [ due to the aggressive union strength French workers are so far unaffected, I believe. I have seen the French Unions in action and I suspect P&O don't want to pick a fight with them] while the CEO is paid around £4.5 million a year. Very similar to that fat pig Phillip Green from BHS/ Arcadia.

There was a lot of trouble when Irish Ferries pulled the same trick, sacked a lot of long time workers and rehired new workers on much lower wages. I am proud to say that whenever I have to take my car from Ireland to the UK I use only Stena Line, who I really, really hope don't do the same s***.

{Admin - feel free to change some text here - I just hate people like Phillip Green !!!]

Pierre3.

we got a sailing with Stena line to Ireland in few months @pierre what they like to sail with
going from Liverpool to Belfast

Personally, I like them. I am more familiar with Belfast- Cairnryan, and Dublin Holyhead.

I normally book seats in the Stena Plus lounge where you can get free food ! I think the tickets cost an extra £18 if they are available. They normally have free papers and magazines, if no-one has robbed them all !!!

I have always found them quick and efficient, and their prices are pretty competitive. Anyway, now P&O have started acting the maggot I won't be using them anyway, and I am not keen on supporting Irish Ferries as they are doing something similar to P&O.

Pierre3.

karlos01 wrote:

we got a sailing with Stena line to Ireland in few months @pierre what they like to sail with
going from Liverpool to Belfast

Its been a few years since I used Stenna line, that crossing is slow and there isn't much to do on it either. There was wifi on board, but at the time it was barely usable as its sattelite based and got everyone bored with nothing to do browsing on their phones etc.

Food was pretty good at the time from what i remember, though wasn't particually cheap.

If you can get a cabin at least you can sleep through some of the journey to make the time pass a bit quicker.

I tended to prefer crossing to Dublin from Holyhead as its a quicker crossing, work came to prefer that as it was also cheaper.

BrianH wrote:

karlos01 wrote:

we got a sailing with Stena line to Ireland in few months @pierre what they like to sail with
going from Liverpool to Belfast

Its been a few years since I used Stenna line, that crossing is slow and there isn't much to do on it either. There was wifi on board, but at the time it was barely usable as its sattelite based and got everyone bored with nothing to do browsing on their phones etc.

I did see it was a 8 hour crossing we looking at the afternoon one so be over in evening time
will look in to the holyhead one we going to friends up in larne

The UK spring budget is due to be announced in parliament tomorrow (Wednesday) by Rishi Sunak,
That would be the ideal opportunity to mention more about Freeports and that P&O will be excluded in future. They were down as a key player.

Too much of British industry with a strategic interest is falling into foreign hands. Shipping, ports, energy, water, chip manufacture, refineries, defence contractors to name just a few industries P&O parent company is Dubai based. People with different outlook on life.
More used to chopping bloody hands off. They were quite happy to take money from the government during the covid lockdown.

Dave3d, I absolutely agree with you, past governments over the last 30 years have been only too happy to sell off the family silver. As is always the case, there are a lot of politicians and business CEO's who have got their snouts in the piggy trough and pocket big rewards for selling out old, reputable businesses to foreigners. The same with big houses all over the UK - sell 'em off to the nearest rich scumbag without any questions about where their money comes from.

People like Johnson and his cronies stick their hands down the trousers of anybody with lots of money in the hope that when they get kicked out of government one of the dishonest brokers somewhere will give them a £2 million a year job. You have only to look at Cameron to see how that works. Remember, he was involved with Greensill and trying to flog his shares before the sh** hit the fan [fortunately he got shafted on that one], and now he is at the same crap with Afiniti, an American company. You can be sure the current crop of Tory wasters are at the same thing.

Only the gobshites in Downing Street could think that is a good idea to let the Chinese have 50% ownership of new nuclear power stations that were going to be built with EDF. What complete prat thought that one up. Thank God the Americans saw that Huawei were dodgy and banned them from government contracts, which meant that Johnson had to follow te same line.

I think that I will put a bid in to buy Camell Laird ship builders - I bet the government will sell it to me for £1000, plus funding for ten years to biuld bicycles !!! Again, only a Tory government could think that it is a good idea to give a couple of million to a ferry company to run a ferry service to Europe from the East coast of England - to a company that had no ships, none, as in not any !! Probably another Tory donor scam so tat someone could stick half a million pounds in their trouser pocket.

Pierre3.

Pierre3 wrote:

Only the gobshites in Downing Street could think that is a good idea to let the Chinese have 50% ownership of new nuclear power stations that were going to be built with EDF. What complete prat thought that one up.

and when you consider that EDF stands for Electricitie Distribution Francais and it is the French nationalised power company, that means our nuclear power stations will be 50% owned by the Chinese and 50% owned by the French......

Going back a few years I was chatting with an engineer at Orange, the mobile phone network. The French network SFR, run by the French nationalised telecoms, had changed it's trading identity to Orange but, as a nationalised industry its profits were capped in France. So simple answer, buy out a UK company and use that to generate uncapped profits. Same goes for Veolia the waste management company, also French.

Hi Richard, I know that EDF are a French company but I would much prefer to deal with a European near neighbour with some kind of democratic political system, than a tyrant controlled state like China.

Don't get me wrong, I am no Labourite who thinks that the Tory party should consigned to history, but I have long railed at successive governments, both Labour and Tory, who have decimated British industry and manufacturing. I read an interesting article in the Guardian [ one of Private Eye's favourite enemies !] which pointed out that about 80% of new manufacturing startups goes immediately to China to get anything made. They very, very rarely look for manufacturing bases in the UK, employing British workers.

Unfortunately, I can also remember the dockers strikes in Liverpool and Felixstowe only too well. I was a truck owner-driver collecting and delivering shipping containers and it was a regular occurence to arrive at Liverpool container dock and find that the knobheads had all walked out over some imagined slight like their tea wasn't hot enough, or the Sun newspaper had been removed from the toilets ! But now, unfortunately, the UK is primarily a service industry society - coffee shops, cleaners and shop staff. Very few proper rewarding jobs unless you have a high level 3rd level education. No miners, no steel workers, no shipyard workers, just jobs in B&Q or Amazon.

I can't imagine either the UK or the USA being able to gear up rapidly to produce weapons or ships like happened during WWII - successive governments have ensure that we rely totally on China to produce our consumer goods. If Xi Jinping says "No" then the UK goes without, unless the government does what Johnson is currently doing, in this case pleading with the Middle East oil producers to sell the UK more oil products.

Sad really when once upon a time nobody told the UK what to do !!

Pierre3.

I think we are all on the same page here. Water companies French or Spanish owned, you can't choose and shop round for water. It is a monopoly. Felixstowe is the largest container port in the UK, handling about 50% of traffic, is owned by Hutchison Whampoa, a Chinese company.
Lack of a long term energy policy and allowing energy companies to be foreign owned. Lack of nuclear investment by successive governments.
I agree about ship building. I am from Birkenhead and my father worked at Cammel Lairds as did most of my friends in the 60's and 70's who did apprenticeships. Lack of apprenticeships now is another issue.
Foreigh investment is good but allowing stategic companies to be bought up is folly.
The steel industry is mostly Indian owned. A petrol refinery near me in Ellesmere Port was sold by Shell to another indian company. Jaguar Landrover bought by Tata. Chobham armour, world leaders in their field sold to a US defence company and broken up. Arm holdings, a major chip manufacturer was going to Nvidia in the US but was knocked back. Then bought by a Japanese bank and now sold on to a US venture capitalist who is trying to sell it on to Nvidia again. Arm Holdings are Nvidia's biggest competitor, they want to buy them to break them up.
Ferry services fall into the category of strategic. I am conservative with a small "c" but I believe in more state intervention.

Gilbertd wrote:

Not used DFDS for a few years but they used to be very good. As they also do a similar season ticket scheme to that offered by P&O at a similar price but it includes a meal, I'll be giving them a try next time and, unless there's anything I don't particularly like, will be getting a DFDS season ticket. The only downside is that while their crossings are regular, not all are Dover-Calais, some of Dover-Dunkirk. DFDS introduced a couple of new ferries a few years ago which, at the time were the biggest on the route and I used them a few times. Only when P&O introduced their Spirit of Britain and Spirit of France ferries did they loose the biggest on the Channel title. Although considering Spirit of Britain, along with the smaller Pride of Canterbury and Pride of Kent, is tied up in Dover harbour, Pride of Burgundy is tied up in Dunkirk and Spirit of France is halfway through a refit in Rotterdam, none are going anywhere at the moment.

When I checked for yesterday an outbound around 09:00 with the return at 22:00, DFDS wanted £155 while Irish Ferries was £124. The only pandemic restrictions now, assuming fully jabbed and boosted, are that the French want a signed declaration that you don't have any symptoms and haven't knowingly contacted anyone who is positive in the last week and proof of vaccination status. In saying that, I handed my passport and declaration to the French Immigration lady on my way out and she gave me the declaration back and only wanted to see my vac status on my phone from the NHS app. No restrictions at all coming back, not even the dreaded passenger locator form. Can't predict anything on wars or fuel prices though, my crystal ball isn't that good......

Thanks Richard - useful info :)

I don't see this having anything to do with Brexit or Johnson - the employment laws haven't changed since we left the EU and the Government have made statements against the PandO redundancy shite. Of course, that doesn't mean they'll do anything - but we'll have to wait and see.
This is naked greed from the management of P and O. May they rot.

I would think the main reason is the Pandemic. P&O said they've been running at a loss for the last 2 years but while Brexit may have reduced slightly the freight traffic, the main thing has been travel restrictions meaning virtually no tourist traffic. Pre-pandemic there would be at least 6 or 7 lines of cars waiting to load in Dover and usually at least 4 coachloads of people too, This weekend there were 3, but in December there were about 6 or 7 cars and that was it. Travelling back in early December I think I was the only UK registered car sitting the the queue, the others were Romanian registered minibuses carrying, presumably, turkey pluckers coming over to work. Early January wasn't much better with probably no more than 15 cars.

It is the tourist traffic that spend money in the restaurants and the duty free shops too so it wouldn't only be the lack of traffic but the lack of other income. Not only that but I used to pay around £120 return with a 6m trailer whereas now it is over that just for the car and the price doubles as soon as you take up twice the space whereas the freight rates are based on overall length. Freight rates are fixed but tourist rates vary with time of day, day of the week, time of year, school holidays, etc so that is what will have really hurt them.

The other ferry companies would have been affected just as badly but they appear to have accepted it and hoped that it would pick up which it now is rather than stopping just as things would have got better. I see that P&O are now saying they will pay redundancy payments depending on length of service and the longer standing crew members will get up to £170k. It's just the way they went about it and although they are calling it redundancy it isn't. If a job role is removed that makes the person that has been doing the work redundant. So when they closed the restaurants the staff working there would no longer have a role so that is redundancy, the rest of the crews have been sacked pure and simple. Talking to one of the Port of Dover staff on Sunday morning he said that the last P&O ferry to return to Dover left the passengers sitting on the dock in Calais and came over empty so they didn't give a toss about their customers either.

Thanks for the report/s on P&O Richard, very interesting/apposite insights, similarly excellent analyses from Pierre3 and Dave3d too: Obviously Downing Street had much to answer for here (notably our 'slippery' Transport Secretary -Grant Schapps- of course). I really can't imagine the CEO of any UK corporation 'explaining' why he "had no option but to break the Law" to "save the company" under any Government other that the current 'just-make-it-up-as-you-go-along' buffoons either. Then again perhaps a PPE degree from Oxford just does not prepare these oafs for 'real life'.... ?

As for foreign ownership the main problem with "Selling the Family Silver" is that ultimately you then end up eating with plastic knives and forks, which can break easily.. Similarly our lax Employment Laws (as compared to the rest of Europe) and Company/Utility Ownership Rules mean we are 'attractive' - and still ripe - for the kind of crass exploitation we have seen for a few decades now. Anyone know any EU Utilities similarly owned/controlled by UK entities/consortia... ??

Similarly on Energy - and as previously mentioned Chinese Nuclear Reactors in conjunction with EDF is simply a joke.... After much debate/discussion we left (then re-joined...) the ITER (Fusion) Consortium to 'do our own things' but for those unaware there are plans afoot now for (Rolls Royce) Mini-Reactors (SMRs) to be built too, although I feel a jobs-for-the-boys (ie. actually an 'investor opportunity') HS2-Type situation coming on... Still being touted as "16 to be provided -each capable of powering a million homes- by 2025" Hmmm..... That "Lack of Vision" by many Governments coming back to haunt us again. Never mind, whoever is behind these will make a fortune one way or another and get a Peerage/Knighthood too !

Back (more) on topic those Dubai owners of P&O have even more disdain for their workers than their UK CEO of course, exactly in keeping with the standard non-indigenous "employee relations" back in the Middle East..... and don't even get me started on the Qatar 2022 joke either .....

UPDATE: Now the CEO is being 'encouraged' (by the likes of Johnson and Schapps...!) to resign for breaking the law....... Unfortunately (and Contractually) we all know just how that works, he just walks away with c.£1M (and maybe that was actually his plan anyway.....?) "Gross Industrial Conduct" if so though ... but also cheap PR for the Govt. of course !

Here's the committee hearing. The fun starts at 1hr 27m when the P and O Chief Exec is questioned.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOtWoi4quOk

Although I said I wouldn't be using P&O again, and in all honesty didn't expect them to start up again, I had 3 pre-paid returns on a season ticket. I asked about a refund but they pointed me towards the T&Cs which clearly stated that they wouldn't refund anything while they still existed (and if they subsequently went bust I'd be unlikely to get anything anyway). Tried to book one crossing with them a couple of weeks ago but as none of their ships had passed the safety inspection they weren't operating so couldn't provide me with a crossing and booked me with DFDS instead. Paid for by P&O from my season ticket, a bit of a result really.

Then I needed a crossing going out on Thursday and coming back today. Initially we were booked on P& O both ways, then they sent e an email saying the outbound crossing had been pushed back by 2.5 hours and if this wasn't suitable they'd transfer me to DFDS. So I said to go for it and used DFDS, but paid for on my pre-paid P&O season ticket. Only problem was, we were coming back with P&O.....

They currently only have the Spirit of Britain running, so there's a crossing every 4 hours. They actually moved our our return back by an hour but we weren't too bothered as it meant we didn't have to get up at stupid o'clock to set off. Driving onto the ferry and parking up we were directed to the correct place by a smiling, not sure what the PC correct expression is these days, dark skinned gentleman who greeted everyone with a wave and a good afternoon. In the lounge it was a different matter. One English guy, who had probably escaped the chop and two others who looked like they'd picked them up from the refugee camp in Calais, put them in an ill fitting suit and told them to got on with it. English was most definitely not their first language, if indeed they actually spoke it and they didn't seem to understand it, they couldn't work the tills and they couldn't count out the change correctly if someone paid with cash (the guy next to me paid in cash, the till said he needed 65p in change and was given four 5p pieces.....). As for speed of service, blimey, the one guy on his own would have been faster without his 'helpers'. Fortunately the skipper sounded English when he came on the tannoy although we did follow a DFDS ferry across the Channel so there was a pretty good chance we wouldn't get lost.....