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Crown is left out in the cold
Page 10
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LI by Dominic Perry
A Liverpool-oasecl international haulier has gone into administration, blaming its financial crisis on the state of the industry.
Merseyside operator Crown Cold Stores, which trades as Thorburn International Transport, called in administrators BKR Haines Watts on 2 September.
Boss Wallace Thorburn says: "The top and bottom of it is that the government is doing its best to put all international hauliers out of business. There's enough foreign hauliers coming in anyway, without UK operators trying to pull the rug out from under one another."
Thorburn International has traded for 30 years, with a brief pause in 1998 when the firm in its original guise was liquidated. However, the transport operation was brought under Thorburn's existing firm, Crown Cold Stores.
Although Thorburn is no longer a director of Crown, its accounts state that he remains in ultimate control and he is still its transport manager. His daughter Karen remains a company director.
Edwin Kirkwood, a partner from BKR Haines Watts, says that the firm has every intention of continuing to trade and promises that all its creditors will be paid.
He says A is planning to set up a company voluntary agreement under which the business will put away a certain amount per month to pay off its creditors with.
Thorburn adds: "We've played this game straight for 20 years, never given into temptation unlike other firms, and you feel that this isn't much of a reward."
The firm's most recent accounts show that in the year ending 31 March 2001 it made a pre-tax profit of £18,382. The fleet of 15 trucks hauls pharmaceutical products.