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ANY PORT IN A STORM
Page 3
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The chaos at the country's southern ports over the past few years has been as predictable as it is crippling for the UK economy.
Predictable because the industry has long complained that it is near full capacity: in 2001 a House of Commons transport sub-committee warned that current capacity would be "fully utilised in three years' time". Four years have since passed, the ports are full and still the government delays and dithers over essential deep-sea port expansion.
And crippling because the time, risk and cost of securing consent for major developments are now so great as to be a potential deterrent for developers.
Meanwhile, ships continue to be shut out of UK ports during peak season and the queues of HGVs snaking out of Southampton and Felixstowe continue to enrage everyone involved in the distribution process.
The creation of a Best Practice guide, presumably to squeeze any remaining productivity out of a system already desperately over-stretched, is the smallest of positive moves. It is little more than a token gesture to the government that the industry has sat round a table and admitted the current process is fundamentally flawed.
But container operators should take note recognising that logistics providers are second to none when it comes to reaping a profit in the face of overwhelming odds, the onus for managing the smooth flow of containers and freight has been laid almost entirely on the ports' customers. The Freight Transport Association, British Ports Association, British International Freight Association, hauliers... they all know who wields the power: the demurrage-charging global shipping lines and consignees. As a result, these customers have a duty to everyone else in the chain to identify and communicate their own delivery windows.
Transport operators have their house in order. While the government continues to sit around watching Rome burn, the rest of the distribution chain must now show UK hauliers it is capable of showing initiative and enterprise in the face of increasing turmoil.