Why should a foreign lorry-driver want to apply for a British visa that lasts for only six months?

sir – The idea that allowing 5,000 HGV drivers to come in from Europe for six months is going to solve the distribution problem shows how little imagination the British Government has.

We have a shortage of between 80,000 and 100,000 drivers – so until replacements are recruited and trained, that’s how many visas we need to offer.

Visas are for six months. There are similar shortages on the Continent, where pay and conditions are more attractive than in Britain, so who is going to uproot themselves, pay for a visa and find accommodation, only to be sent home six months later?

It will take longer than six months to recruit and train replacement drivers. A more reasonable visa would be for two years.

Keith Appleyard

West Wickham, Kent

sir – Urgently want more HGV drivers from overseas? Then just announce that a few petrol stations are closing, and – bingo! – the great British public oblige. Roger Montague

Bushey Heath, Hertfordshire

sir – As I read of empty supermarket shelves and petrol station queues in Britain, here in southern Portugal, where I am currently on holiday, milk and other everyday items are conspicuously absent from the local store shelves.

Panic buying and a lack of HGV drivers are clearly not peculiar to Britain.

Ursula Starkie

Almancil, Faro, Portugal

sir – Well done, Boris Johnson, for standing up for the wages of lorry drivers.

People have had enough of cheap labour, mainly from EU countries. We need British jobs for British workers in a high-paid Brexit economy. Then watch Britain flourish.

Geoffrey Brooking

Havant, Hampshire sir – I was saddened by the first-person article written by Adam Eastwood on being a HGV driver (September 25). At the peak of the Covid pandemic I had to go into work, being a nurse. If London transport drivers had not gone to work and HGV drivers had not delivered the food I was able to buy from M&S after work, I would not have been able to carry out my professional duties and look after my patients.

As a country, we all, I feel, need to step back and see how everyone in every walk of life needs one another to get this great country back on its feet.

So it is sad that Mr Eastwood ended up leaving his profession. It requires skill to drive those enormous vehicles. Mary Moore London E2 sir – Isn’t it strange that ministers can ask HGV drivers to come out of retirement to help with the current delivery problems? Would it be possible for the same ministers to ask their own staff at DVLA (and other Government bodies) to return to normal working so that we can get HGV licences renewed and returned ? Mike Metcalfe

Butleigh, Somerset

sir – If DVLA staff working from home are barred from processing licences, and a backlog has built up (report, September 25), what work are these civil servants doing at home? Nicholas Moate

Falmouth, Cornwall

sir – I am surprised our leaders have not come up with the batty idea of driverless lorries as a solution to the lorry driver crisis. Interestingly, they have not even mentioned electric lorries (although they also require drivers). I wonder why.

Professor Bryan Woodward Loughborough, Leicestershire

sir – Please report a shortage in alcohol supply. We could all do with a good party.

Stuart Buxton

Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire