The figure, extrapolated from estimates of the daily running expenses of affected parts of Scotland’s fleet of 12000-plus 16-44 tonne lorries, represents only a small fraction of the total cost to the economy of severe weather of the type seen across Scotland last week.
The impact is also measured in lost labour, non-delivery and non-sale of goods, as well as the cost of local and national government clearance operations and emergency services.
Last week’s transport crisis has prompted the SFTA to urge the Scottish Government to consider extending collaboration with its membership to minimise future disruption.
A spokesman for the organisation told the Sunday Herald that the industry had advised the Scottish Government and its agency Transport Scotland to lease or borrow SFTA members’ plant and equipment, as well as labour, to help minimise gridlock of the sort seen on Scottish arterial roads on Monday and Tuesday.
“We have made the offer, though there seems to be a certain bureaucratic resistance to the idea in government circles,” a spokesman told the Sunday Herald, suggesting that the alleged reluctance to take up the offer might be based on public sector concerns about its liability for private sector personnel and borrowed equipment.
The call was backed by Phil Flanders, director of the Scottish Road Haulage Association, who said, “hundreds of our members have equipment and warehouses which could be useful, and one guy I know in North Lanarkshire offered this to the Council but was told to go away becaue he was not on the approved list, and it was against health and safety regulations. This is despite the fact that these people are professionals and are held to professional health and safety standards.”
“We need to forget some of the rules just to get back to normal, and a bit of common sense on health and safety is required; if we play strictly by the rules all the time, we’re buggered. In the good old days we used to muck in together, it shouldn’t be too difficult.”
Graham Birse, managing director of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce said of the hauliers’ offer: “This is precisely the kind of support and leadership the private sector is able to offer the government in this crisis. It’s an extremely effective example of what we have long been calling for – national co-ordination calling on all our resources. “Any decision to prevaricate over accepting such a generous offer makes no sense at all, either to employers trying to keep their businesses active and their staff employed and paid, or to ordinary citizens who are struggling to go about their daily business.”
“Our road hauliers are precisely the people who have the skills and equipment to deal with the situation immediately.
The SFTA’s figure of £2.8m of daily running costs is based on the average cost figures per annum for a 17-tonne box or curtain-sided vehicle, and for a 38-tonne articulated vehicle with a two-axle trailer/three-axle curtain -sided semi-trailer, divided by 365 days.
A spokeswoman for Transport Scotland said that “all of the agency’s operating companies are private sector companies with access to a private sector supply chain”, and that its operating company winter maintenance plan states the additional plant that they can call on.
She added that the current approach “allows us, in a emergency, to call in additional plant without restriction to the trunk road network”
“As the Trunk Road Operating Companies are private organisations they can access the private sector supply chain to bring in whatever resources they deem necessary to deliver their winter service. During prolonged periods of severe weather conditions they may need to procure additional resources to fulfil their contractual obligations.
“[Health and safety] is not a problem on trunk roads. However, our recommendation is that anyone working on trunk roads and with heavy complicated vehicles needs to be properly trained to ensure safety.”
Transport Scotland is set to reassess its severe weather preparedness “once this current winter period has passed”.
