Transport industry prepares for Saturday push

<p>There has been good uptake of truck slots for container pick-ups tomorrow (Saturday, October 29) at major Australian ports, but the Sunday truck bookings are again understood to be quiet as importer premises will remain closed.</p> <p>Patrick said that at 0600 hrs today, occupation of its terminals was improving, with 1,426 cleared containers at Port Botany and 2,083 at East Swanson in Melbourne.</p> <p>In the 24 hours up to 0600, it had delivered at a rate 1,020 boxes from Port Botany and 1,204 from East Swanson. </p> <p>Both Patrick’s Fremantle and Brisbane terminals are holding large numbers of cleared boxes as well with nearly 1,000 at North Quay and 700 at Fisherman Islands. </p> <p>P&#38O Australia managing director Tim Blood said that the stevedores’ Botany facility was down to 70% to 85% of capacity but still dependent on strong weekend movements.</p> <p>"What is out of control is finger pointing to no benefit," he said, and issues such as compensation should wait while industry does whatever it can to shift the backlog.</p> <p>Hugh McMaster, of the New South Wales Road Transport Association, said that his organisation and trucking bodies in other states have been contacting state business firms, encouraging them to open receival premises to use Sunday slots. </p> <p>However, he called for stevedores to concentrate more resources on moving containers during normal weekday operating hours. </p> <p>"Stevedores want to work at the weekend to get more use out of their assets, but it has to be a two-way thing", he said. </p> <p>"We can get more through during the week. </p> <p>"My feeling is that there are fewer weekday slots than there were five years ago." </p> <p>However, Mr Blood said that the terminals operate 24&#477 "with the most expensive labour in the transport chain". </p> <p>Some elements in the trucking industry want to go back to the working hours of 20 years ago, he said, when industry reports &#8211 from Peter Morris’s <em>Warehouse to Wharf</em> to last month’s document by Laurie Brereton’s Freight Industry Advisory Board &#8211 have urged longer operating hours. </p> <p>"It is disappointing to hear comments about going backwards," he said. </p> <p>Steve Heraghty, of Sydney’s largest port transporter, Bowport Allroads, and Macarthur Intermodal Shipping Terminal, said that his company had been moving out large number of containers under bond to its Minto facilities and converting them. </p> <p>It was better for customers than keeping containers on the terminals, he said. </p> <br />