Association members had the chance reflect on recent events at the NatRoad Conference. It was a time to examine the implications of some significant changes to the industry which have happened in the last year.
“It’s been a big year, and we’ve been working very hard,” said NatRoad Chair, Paul Fellows, at the opening of this year’s NatRoad Conference, held in Coffs Harbour.
“NatRoad has been at the forefront of some really significant changes to the industry, we’ve been in and out of ministerial meetings, industry round tables and knocking on departmental doors in federal and state governments.
“We’ve been very vocal about the Heavy Vehicle National Law and the farce it’s become, but we’re working towards getting those heavy vehicle rules changed. On tolls, we’ve worked very hard. Our hard working CEO, Warren Clark, has gone hard on trying to get these tolls dropped or not increased.
“We’ve been working very heavily with a sensible approach to PBS access. From my own experience, it’s enough to drive you insane, but we’ve been working very hard to try and get that sped up. We’ve been working on improving bridge assessments.
“Every time you get a bridge assessment, it’s seven grand. I get mine this week, and someone else will get theirs done next week. That’s a clip of the ticket all the way through, and we think there may be some light in the tunnel with that.”
The last year has seen the passing of the Closing Loopholes Fair Work legislation and NatRoad was working representing the interests of the employers. Another major initiative for the organisation this year was joining the International Road Transport Union, which, as the voice of more than 3.5 million companies operating mobility and logistics services in over 100 countries, says it ‘leads solutions to help the world move freight better’.
An online presentation to the conference from Natalia Corchado, Strategic Planning and Business Specialist at the IRU, saw her provide some data about the global nature of the driver shortage. She was able to give the conference a picture of the size of the issue in 2024. She presented a snapshot of the truck driver population and a forecast for the coming years.
“Why did we start this study?”, asked Natalia. “Because our members, our operators, were facing a huge shortage and there were no figures to prove that this was a reality, or at least not at a supranational level. We decided to carry out this study, an online survey that is disseminated to transport operators through our members, our national associations.
“There were 21 countries that were surveyed, and we collected more than 4000 answers. I would like to really thank NatRoad and their members for making this initiative possible for the first time in Australia.
“We have a benchmark to put Australia in the global context. The share of companies surveyed that were facing severe or very severe difficulties was close to 50 per cent. In Europe, it was even higher, 70 per cent.”
“Over 26,000 drivers are needed to fill the current gaps in the trucking sector, with big fleet operators the most impacted. There is a need for around 180,000 drivers for an effective road transport sector, so this represents a 14.4 per cent shortfall, well over the current national job vacancy rate of between five and six per cent.”
There is also a large portion of drivers nearing retirement age. The survey found almost 50 per cent of all drivers were over the age of 55, with an average age of 49. The participation of young people and women in the industry is very low, with 5.2 per cent of drivers under 25 and just 6.5 per cent women.
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