The carriers begin this midnight the indefinite strike called by the National Platform in Defense of the Transport Sector that could cost the economy 600 million euros a day, as it is a cessation of activity due to campaigns as important as ‘Black Friday’ or Christmas.
This forecast of losses has been made by the OBS Business School professor Eduardo Irastorza, according to the data extracted from the report on ‘Black Friday’, during which it is calculated that sales in Spain increase by 706%although the record in the European Union could be set by Germany, where the rise is expected to be 2,418%.
The platform, which brings together the self-employed and small businesses, although its number of associates is not known, is mobilized in protest at the non-compliance by the shippers (customers of the carriers) of the law that prohibits working low cost and the free participation of drivers in loading and unloading tasks.
This is the same organization that, last March, starred in a transport stoppage that lasted twenty daysgenerating serious problems in the supply chain.
Unlike that protest, which was joined by some other associations such as Fenadismer, Fetransa or Feintra, On this occasion, both the employers’ organizations and the sectoral organizations grouped in the National Committee for Road Transport (CNTC) have not supported the strike.
As a consequence of that first strike and a previous threat from the CNTC in December 2021, between March and August two royal decree-laws were approved with measures to improve the situation of the sector agreed between the national committee and the Ministry of Transport.
In early August, the royal decree-law 14/2022 of economic sustainability measures in the field of transport, which incorporates modifications in Law 15/2009 of the contract for land transport of goods, to try to guarantee that the price of transport is higher than the actual individual costs and expenses affected by the carrier.
breaking the law
However, small carriers denounce that freight companies “they continue neither to offer nor to pay prices that give reality to the costs that truly give rise to a fair, healthy and viable economy”, as well as the passivity of the Administration in the control of the application of the law.
Therefore, in a letter sent at the end of October to the Minister of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, Raquel Sánchezthe platform suggested a list of changes (copied from the French transport code) to the royal decree law of August to ensure that it achieves the desired objectives.
The ministry promised last Thursday, in a meeting with the management of the platform, to “reinforce” inspections to ensure that carriers do not work below their costs and approve, in the coming weeks, a 2023 inspection plan, which will include for the first time a specific line of action for price control, late payment and loading and unloading, according to with the approved regulations.
The platform requested that these commitment announcements be included in a document signed before midnight this Sunday, so that the carriers know that they are going to be fulfilled and in what period, in order to be able to assess the cancellation of the strike, which is not has happened, so the mobilization continues.
During the first day of strike, this Monday, carriers will participate in a demonstration in Madrid which will make a walking tour from the Plaza de Carlos V (Atocha) to the Ministry of Transport, and in which the platform hopes that associations from other sectors such as agriculture, livestock and hospitality will also participate.