Cheap car insurer gets to grips with rubber-wear!

Time for our weekly rubber round-up cheap car insurers, and it's not a good week for fans of tyres; as its been widely reported that the cost of wheel-shaped rubber is set to go through the roof. For those cheap car insurers who haven't been paying attention, over the past 12 months the cost of rubber products on the whole has nearly doubled. Shredding many tyre manufacturers' yearly profits; and having a devastating effect on the tills at Ann Summers. It's not until later this year however, if early forecasts are correct, that customers (so that will be cheap car insurers like you, and you and you..) will experience difficulties getting their hands on rubber. For a decent price anyway. A combination of factors have determined this, and through the power of research and good luck, this work-a-holic cheap car insurance journo has been told what they are.

Firstly there's been a distinctly sub-standard rubber harvest in Asia , through lack of rain or something. Then there's been a dramatic increase in cost of oil-derived chemicals used as part of the production process, due to disputes and fallings out in the middle east over the odd can of crude oil as per. And then cheap car insurers hanging on my every word, there's china. China have a lot to answer for at the moment. They're attempting to piece together crap cars and then flog them to us, take over Africa because no-one else has for a while, and, stoically helping to push up the costs of rubber worldwide, simply because they want so damn much of the stuff. Demand outstripping supply I believe is the term academics refer to it as cheap car insurers. Emerging markets are what china are labelled. Along with greedy.

What it means to the man on the street is anyone's guess. But since I'm party to this privileged information as a motoring scribe means I don't have to arrive at my normal, hap-hazard, ill-informed conclusion. It means you're all screwed. Or at least you're all going to be when it comes round to re-cladding your alloys in something that may keep your car on the road. The cost of replacing all the tyres on an average family car by the end of this year could spiral by as much as £50; whilst those of you who have your sports cars shod in fancy-Dan rubber wear will be forking out £300 quid more than usual. Forcing many Corsa's off the road. At least one positive amid all this negativity. One tyre industry insider told someone very important, who passed it on to someone else, slightly less important, who in turn whispered it to someone really not that important, who imparted this information to a stoat, whose dying words as the Quotedetective.com pool car moulded it into the shape of the road beneath it's wheels, were this: "When raw materials go up, so does the price of the final product. Sometimes it's possible for manufacturers to absorb this, but when there's been a sustained period of increases, the likes of which we are currently seeing, the companies do have to start passing them on to consumers." Naturally.

The worrying thing that comes from all this is the underlying fact that many people already living perilously close to the bread line, getting by on only state benefits, wont have the funds to re-grip their 19" chromed and polished specialist alloys, and therefore will continue to run round on knackered rubber; which will raise the issue of safety, and the thought that they could be putting their lives in imminent danger. Briefly. As this very same author wrote in a previous, equally as cutting edge article recently, many of you already wait until the very last minute before you swap your tyres, until they're worn down and beyond the 1.6mm current depth limit, so God alone knows what will happen soon. You simply can't compromise your life. Unless you own a jazzed-up Corsa. Only then can your crass stupidity be overlooked. And possibly admired. That said some of you incredibly bright people who come to us for cheap car insurance may drive a Corsa, for which I apologize. After you do. As we'll cheaply insure any old car, providing it's got some sort of rubber on it.

Date - 08/08/2006