Border disorder in Italy
Page 8
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• Chaos reigned in Italy last week and at the beginning of this week customs officers staged a work-to-rule. When the dispute began 10 days ago it was centred on the main Mont Blanc customs point at Aosta, but it quickly spread to every customs compound in Italy.
Thousands of truck drivers, many of them British, were marooned at the border over the weekend. A queue of more tha 900 trucks was reported at the Brenner Pass last Friday (11 December) and the tailback at Mont Blanc was even bigger. Commercial Motor drove down to the Frejus Tunnel crossing into Italy, just north of Turin, two days after the industrial action had begun. We found livestock hauliers preparing for delays of over 24 hours on the Italian side of Frejus, and normal groupage hauliers were ready to sit it out for even longer.
This is the first serious industrial action on the Italian border since the notorious strike in 1985, when French drivers retaliated by blockading the Mont Blanc tunnel, creating giant tailbacks which lasted for three weeks. Customs
officers in Italy work from 8am to 2pm, after which they are paid overtime.
They have been refusing to work overtime for the past ten days, and have deliberately been working slowly during their official hours.
Swains of Stretton had a truck stuck at the border for 24 hours, from Friday night to Saturday afternoon. According to the firm: "We had a whole
range of delays last week. Drivers were left in the cold to sit and wait." The Italians have given no formal warnings or reasons for the action, says Swains: "They certainly work in mysterious ways."
One Christian Salvesen vehicle was marooned for two days before getting clearance at Aosta: "Even when the customs officers come back, they do not work fast enough to clear the huge backlogs," says the company. "We always have a lot of problems at Aosta." Only a handful of trucks are being cleared each day, says Christian Salvesen. The company usually carries fresh or frozen meat and frozen fish in and out of Italy. Very few loads have been lost or damaged so far, and officials still seem to be giving priority to fresh food and livestock.
Martintrux has suffered delays to almost all 15 of its trucks which regularly run to Italy. According to transport manager Dave Salter: "One truck was stuck all weekend because of the dispute."
Kent-based Laser Transport had a vehicle held up in Italy for two days and found that the customs compounds in Turin had ground to a complete halt last week: "The Italians are a law unto themselves," says the company's transport manager John Holt.
The go-slow was due to end in the middle of the week — but as Commercial Motor went to press, most of the operators we contacted did not believe that the dispute would end so soon: they all expected the industrial action to continue for the foreseeable future.
0 See pages 33 to 36 for a more detailed account of driving to Italy and back.