Freight Victoria, a government entity set up to co-ordinate on freight matters, has declared that there are prolonged container supply chain disruptions at the Port of Melbourne which justifies the notification of a “Disruption Event” under a Voluntary Code of Practice.
That, in turn, leads to the Department for Transport and Planning setting up and chairing a “Disruption Response Group” – which met for the first time today – with representation from a range of bodies including the Port of Melbourne, the Container Transport Alliance Australia, the Freight and Trade Alliance, Shipping Australia, container terminal operators and other industry stakeholders.
The Disruption Response Group will develop a Disruption Response Plan with the aim of alleviating the operational and financial cost impacts associated with the disruption event, including:
- Improving awareness and monitoring of the disruption event
- Managing heavy vehicle access to the Port of Melbourne
- Minimising commercial implications due to congestion
- Supporting exporter operations
- Managing empty container movement and storage
- Minimising impact of concurrent network disruptions due to infrastructure work
Industry representatives, specifically, the Freight & Trade Alliance, the Container Transport Alliance Australia, and Shipping Australia, initiated the move by writing a joint letter to the Victorian Department of Transport and Planning on 15 December urging that a declaration be made.
“Protected Industrial Action (PIA) that commenced in October 2023 at DP World container terminals nationally is causing significant disruption to trade operations through the Port of Melbourne.
Alarmingly, we understand that recent enterprise agreement negotiations have failed in addressing the impasse, suggesting PIA may continue for an extended period through to Christmas and well into the new year.
From an export and import perspective, delays and costs are jeopardising business viability and are fuelling inflationary pressures, causing reputational harm to Victoria and Australia more broadly as a reliable trading nation… we request that the Department of Transport and Planning (DTP) declare a ‘disruption event’ and immediately convene a Disruption Response Group in line with the framework established in the Voluntary Code of Practice (VCoP),” the three industry bodies declared.
That was followed by a meeting on Wednesday in which the industry urged government to act and presented a variety of verbal testimony about the adverse effects that the industrial action is having on trade in Victoria.
Shipping Australia has, however, been disappointed to note that, despite the repeated urging of different sectors of industry, to specifically note that there is significant supply chain disruption because of industrial action, Freight Victoria did not specifically list industrial action as a contributing factor to the disruption in its declaration nor in the draft terms of reference that was presented to the Disruption Response Group today.
Industry bodies again pointed out that the root cause of most of the significant supply chain disruption in Victoria at the moment, and for the last few months, has been because of the ongoing industrial action. Industry bodies have advised Freight Victoria that the declaration and the draft terms of reference for the Disruption Response Group should reflect this reality.
