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NFC wants 40pc more
Page 13
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TANKEIZEIGHT, the gational Freight Consortiun's bulk tanker subsidiary, S looking for 40 per cent note productivity from the drivers working on its newly won Texaco fuel contract.
NFC chairman Sir Peter Thompson said this last week at a London conference for retail managers, organised by Super Marketing newspaper, when he argued in favour of retailers using specialist transport companies to move their goods.
Sir Peter said that the Transport and General Workers' Union prefers to deal with in-house transport companies rather than hire or reward operators. "They constantly squeal when we take over because they won't get as much out of us."
He referred to NEC's re:ern takeover of "a major oil :.oinpany's transport" — it took over the Texaco contract at the beginning of this month — and said the TGWU is "still squealing" about it. He said that NFC wants to pay the drivers more than be, fore, but it expects 40 per cent more work from them by NEC standards.
When the Texaco deal was announced in August. NR: said it would take over about two thirds of the 570 driving and maintenance staff at Texaco -and Texaco would close five of its 22 depots.
Customers approach NFC, he said, because of industrial relations problems, in which drivers' wages go "sky high'', and these costs reflect into the rest of the company's system.
But if transport is pushed off into another company, a rorzion sanitaire seems to appear and wage costs are controlled.
Since NFC was privatised in 1982, it has only had one two-day stoppage at one depot and a go-slow at other depots which lasted only a week, Sir Peter said.
He also argued that transport companies can save retailers capital expenditure. "Many supermarket cornpanics pride themselves on the return on capital employed. NFC cannot get that sort of return. We are happy to run trucks on a less positive rate of return," he said.
He added that NEC can "do marvels with taking things off the balance sheets" of its customers.
• Sir Peter also revealed that NFC's SPD-dominated distribution activities expects to increase turnover from ill 47.4 million in 1984/85 to 1:176.3 million in 1985/86, with the number of vehicles rising from 2,318 to 2,445 and the number of locations filling from 131 to 123.
SPD Contact Distribution has just won a t2.2 million contract to operate a Test() distribution centre at Thornbury, near Bristol. It serves 85 Tesco branches in South Wales and South West England and requires 26 lorries.