It’s time industry ‘yes men’ gave us some support
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“WE NEED A LEVEL playing ield”, said Mike Presniell recently in CM (30 June), and indeed we do. As an operator on European journeys, it really gets my goat that the industry’s “yes men” are doing very little in support of UK-based operators, yet feel the need to line the pockets inadvertently of our foreign operators by way of free road pricing throughout the UK.
These foreign truck operators are undermining the UK-based operator by arriving at Dover or Portsmouth brimming with cheap rebated fuel purchased on the Continent and contributing nothing towards our economy. How the hell is this industry supposed to continue?
There are only a few more nails the haulage industry cofin can take before it is inally sealed and buried. The recent proposal of lifting cabotage regulations will be that inal nail!
I would say to the EC’s transport commissioner Siim Kallas (pictured), you truly are a prize plum with your views on cabotage regulation. Maybe you need to talk to some of the recently failed transport business owners and ask them why they sadly went to the wall. I am certain most will put fuel charges in the UK, and unfair foreign competition as two of the direct causes.
When the likes of Joseph Rice, a haulier with more than 125 years service to the industry, close the doors, you can be assured something is amiss.
When I am engaged on French operations, it can cost me up to €105.50 just to use one motorway (A6) for six or so hours from Lyon to Paris, then a further €50 to get from the northern edge of Paris to Caen or Calais.
I understand that you get what you pay for, and I cannot fault the French motorway network. But why is it we are not charging foreign trucks to use our road infrastructure?
I use the word “infrastructure” in the loosest possibleway, as I feel our roads are becoming some of the worst in Europe, with not enough secure truckstops, and some truly dire facilities.
Start a road-charging system for foreign-registered trucks and do it now. Reinvest this money in the UK road network, decent trucks, and maybe, just maybe, pass on some fuel rebates to an already cash-strapped UK haulage industry.
The UK’s transport industry is in rapid decline and will continue to be so until the association “yes men” wake up and smell the coffee. Indeed I concur with Presniell: stand and ight.
Chris Hunter Director Wyatt Transport