Irish Road Haulage Association hits out at fuel suppliers
- Photo: Vincent Cauldwell, President, Irish Road Haulage Association
Irish Road Haulage Association hits out at fuel suppliers
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“Fuel suppliers are profiteering and putting hauliers out of business while the Government’s environmental policy backfires” …Vincent Caulfield, President, Irish Road Haulage Association
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The Irish Road Haulage Association has hit out at fuel suppliers who, the association says, are taking advantage of the Government’s Bio-fuels Obligation Scheme in order to increase transport fuel prices.
The issue was raised recently by the Irish Road Haulage Association while seeking a crisis meeting with Enterprise Minister Batt O’Keeffe to find ways to protect its members from job losses.
The Association says that fuel suppliers have hijacked the Government’s Bio-fuels Obligation Scheme to increase prices which will cripple some hauliers by as much as €50,000 per annum.
The scheme, which came into effect on July 1st 2010, requires companies supplying fuel to the Irish market to ensure that the transport fuel they sell each year includes an overall mix of 4% bio-fuel. The policy has led to increased fuel prices as suppliers pass on the cost of putting the necessary infrastructure in place to supply fuel products which comply with the new legislation.
“The Government has scored a spectacular own goal and hauliers throughout the country are paying the price,” said Mr. Vincent Caulfield, President of the Irish Road Haulage Association. “The scheme has failed to reduce fuel costs and the Government has failed to respond to the reality that fuel suppliers have been given a free hand to set whatever price they choose,” he added.
“Increases already vary between 0.8 cent and 1.12 cent per litre. A price increase of 1.4 cent per litre adds €50,000 to the operating costs of a haulier with 40 trucks and that cost is simply not recoupable given all of the economic challenges currently facing operators,” he said.
The Association is calling upon the Government to examine the impact of the scheme on the haulage industry and to investigate fuel suppliers in light of the varying price increases they have imposed.
“The Government has sat idly by as haulage businesses struggle to respond to increased operating costs,” said Mr Caulfield. “We have taken enough. It is time the Government took action to protect jobs rather than introducing a succession of policies which undermine the survival of haulage businesses,” he concluded.
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