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Counting the cost of the transport strike

Thu, 19 June 10:00

Counting the cost of the transport strike

Burnt-out lorries: Testimony to strikers’ feelings

THE transport strike began at midnight last Monday and soon spread to Portugal and France, where border crossings were blockaded by angry truck drivers, effectively sealing the country off. Food, fuel and goods were stranded all across the Iberian Peninsula as drivers belonging to transport associations picketed industrial estates and transport hubs.
The drivers were demanding that the Spanish government concede on a number of measures to compensate the drivers for the 20 per cent rise in fuel costs over the last year. According to Julio Villaescusa, President of the National Federation of Road Transport Associations (Fenadismer) which represents many drivers who own their own trucks, they demand a minimum tariff for their transport services which would at least cover their costs.
Minister for Development Magdalena Álvarez stated that a 54-point agreement had been reached with 88 per cent of lorry drivers’ associations but Fenadismer and another union, Confedetrans, rejected the offer, countering that these measures have been in place for years. The Spanish president, Jose Luis Zapatero, said the government is ‘clearly sensitive’ to the impact rising fuel costs are having on the transport industry but concessions are limited as the price of oil is rising across the world.
Two lorry drivers on picket duty during the stoppage have lost their lives. The first was a Portuguese trucker who died when trying to stop a lorry in the town of Alcanena, to the north of Lisbon.
The second incident occurred in Granada, when 47-year-old Julio Cervilla Soto, from Peligros, was crushed against the central reservation and fell beneath the rear wheels of an articulated lorry. He had been working as a self-employed lorry driver with his own vehicle, and leaves a widow and children. The offending driver was detained at the scene.
Farmers and fishermen called off their support for the transport workers’ strike after two days. According to Frederico Felix, president of the Enterprise Federation of Agricultural Foodstuff of Valencia, a million chickens a day have died on stranded lorries. Felix said that a lack of fodder for livestock is costing the region’s farmers millions of euros a day in lost earnings and animals. Guardia Civil officers have made 71 arrests and escorted more than 6,000 vehicles during the strike so far.

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