Here we see a supreme example of a safety solution waiting, waiting and waiting to get adopted, but the wheels of progress grind exceedingly slow. This video was made back in 2016, but this is still the only working example of such a system in Australia.
This award winning pivoting access frame was designed and built in Victoria and has been working for the past three years. It addresses a fundamental problem for the livestock transporting industry, that of driver safety.
When unloading animals from their trailers driver have to make sure the animals move correctly through the series of gates to the unloading ramp and off into the sale yard, feedlot of abattoir. Without an access frame like the onbe in this video the driver will either have to walk along the top of the 4.6 metre high crate or climb up the side to make the animals move. Neither of these solutions is desirable and create major workplace health and safety issues.
The process to get more frames erected around the country has not moved. In most cases the owners of a facility are not willing to pay for the frame to improve the safety of drivers delivering to their site.
Instead, the Australian Livestock and Rural Transporters Association has set up a project to test a user pays system to try and encourage the take up of a piece of equipment which would have a great impact on driver dafety in the industry.
“In 2017 the ALRTA Animal Welfare Committee proposed a trial it to build a pivoting access frame at a facility,” said Sue Davies, ALRTA Project Officer at a recent Adelaide Conference. “This was to test feasibility of a user-pays access system, which could recover access frame costs.
“A site in south-east Queensland was chosen for the trial. During the process of installation there have been a number of technical challenges requiring site-specific solutions, now the frame moves parallel rather than pivoting towards the trailer.
“The research phase of the project will see a 12 week user-pays trial to establish a price point that people are willing to pay. During this time the use of the frame will be voluntary. The price is expected to be somewhere between $5 and $15 per usage.”
