COMMENT Running on empty T
he Editor’s Comment that I wrote this time last month, about the Government, the Tory Party and Partygate seems like it was from another world. It was a lifetime ago that Sue Gray’s report into whether or not the Westminster bubble and various Whitehall mandarins broke the Covid rules seemed the most important thing we had to talk about. Spoiler alert - they did break the Covid laws, they didn’t think those laws applied to them because they were all working so hard to get us through Covid. Regular readers of this column and the Editor’s Blog will know how I feel about that.
What I felt about that rule-breaking then, I still feel now, but it has, of course, faded into the background, now that we appear to be on the verge of World War Three. We can pussyfoot around in the media all we like, calling it an invasion, a conflict or, if you’re a Vlad-the-Mad-Putin apologist (step forward N Farage) ‘ situation’; from the point of view of the people fleeing Ukraine, watching their lives and everything they have built up come crashing down around them, there is no verge of anything. They are in it, suffering first-hand the dire effects of Putin’s maniacal thirst for power, his desperation to re-write the history of the 20th century, and the West’s willful turning of the proverbial blind eye for too long.
I’m conscious that things are changing by the hour, so anything I write here, today, will be out of date by the time you read it. So, I’ll keep the more up-to-the-minute rants for the Blog, and stick to an issue that is going nowhere. However, the Ukrainian war ends, there will be far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world and for the UK construction sector. Already, the price of fuel has reached unprecedented levels. To be honest it already had, before Putin jackbooted his way into Ukraine, but now that the UK, the US and the EU are putting
CONTACTS Builders Merchants Journal
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EDITORIAL Group Managing Editor: Fiona Russell Horne 01622 699101 07721 841382
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Assistant editor Anjali Sooknanan 01622 699186
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restrictions on the sales and purchase of Russian oil and energy, the cost of the fuel we use to power our vehicles, our factories and our homes is going to soar. Even higher than it already has done. Not only our energy costs, but our food costs: Ukraine, the bread basket of the world. We may not import much of it to the UK, but there are other countries across the globe for whom sky-rocketing wheat costs have serious famine implications. The world needs to re-think how it uses energy, that much has been evident for years. We may have been irritated by the antics of Insulate Britain, blocking up the arteries of our transport infrastructure, but that doesn’t mean the message they aimed to get across wasn’t a valid one. Although, I received a press release today indicating they are going to start all that up again, to which my response is simply: read the room guys. Not now. The other thing that we might be re-thinking is our definition of leadership. Compare the bumbling obfuscation and question evading of our leader during PMQs, the total disconnect between what the Home Secretary says is happening with refugees to the UK and what the civil servants on the ground are doing, and the former comedy actor, playing the role of his life in fatigues in Kyiv. I said it before, this guy is everything you want a President in the 21st century to be. His speeches to both the European Parliament and the House of Commons could and should, redefine how we view our leaders and what we expect from them. So, a re-think is on the cards, surely: of how much energy we use, where it comes from, and, alongside that, our relationship with foreign money, especially when it comes in such large quantities. Turning a blind eye and hoping the mad man goes away isn’t going to cut it. BMJ
Fiona Russell-Horne Group Managing Editor - BMJ
He is the very model of a modern major general WS Gilbert
“ ” CONTENTS
4 Newsround All the industry news 8 News extra
How one merchant is tackling card fees
10 News extra
How one wholesaler is dealing with rising costs
12 People
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14 Business helpdesk Security issues for merchants
16 Viewpoint Getting out face-to face with customers and what to do when apprenticeships don’t work out
20 Merchant Focus MKM has continued to grow by empowering its people
22 Landscaping
Trends and developments for the key Spring selling season
33 Underfloor heating Energy efficiency concerns hit the floor
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36 Decorating New products and trends
38 BMF Industry Voice News and views from the Builders Merchants Federation
41 Rainwater Management
Climate change means more rain in the wrong places
43 Product News New developments from suppliers
46 And Finally News and the BMJ Prize Crossword
March 2022
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