ALC

Governments have taken action to suspend or remove delivery window curfews.

SIGNIFICANT REFORMS DON’T ALWAYS NEED SIGNIFICANT DOLLARS

The COVID-19 pandemic has been an expensive experience for governments around the nation.

Budgets that were in surplus or close to balance have been pushed firmly back into the red, and this will undoubtedly affect the policy choices governments make in the months and years to come.

Yet, significant reforms don’t have to be accompanied by a big spend. As governments turn their minds to policy actions needed to hasten the pace of Australia’s economic recovery, there is significant opportunity to achieve regulatory reforms that will be of lasting benefit to the freight and logistics sector.

The most visible manifestation of the COVID-19 crisis for many in the community was the sight of supermarket shelves that had been stripped bare in the early days of the crisis, as panic buying took hold.

Recent generations of Australians are unaccustomed to shortages of any variety, and the experience has - perhaps for the first time - given many a reason to pause and consider the centrality of effective supply chains to their day-to-day lives.

We all know that ours is an industry that can struggle to capture public imagination. Decades of uninterrupted supply have seen our industry largely taken for granted.

With community awareness of our importance and value heightened, it is time to pursue the regulatory reforms that industry has long sought with renewed vigour. If delivered these reforms can help prevent some of the supply chain challenges we witnessed in the early days of COVID-19, and during the bush fire crisis before that.

In this context, it’s worth bearing in mind that the single most effective government action taken to address supermarket shortages in March did not involve expenditure, but rather the stroke of a ministerial pen.

The most pressing challenge for logistics companies providing services to retail outlets at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic was getting stock into stores quickly enough to satisfy extraordinarily heightened levels of consumer demand.

The existence of curfews that prohibit deliveries during certain hours were a significant barrier to addressing that challenge. Fortunately, they were also one that was easy to address – as within the space of just over a week, governments in state and territory jurisdictions took action to remove or suspend curfews and give logistics companies the flexibility needed to facilitate overnight deliveries into supermarkets.

ALC and its members have long advocated for the removal of such restrictions, as they generally result in higher costs, greater levels of road congestion and are broadly incompatible with the demands of a modern consumer-oriented economy.

Now that the benefits of lifting such

restrictions have been demonstrated, governments should be encouraged to make their removal a permanent part of the new normal.

As ALC has consistently pointed out, many of the challenges facing freight logistics operators today – including road congestion, urban encroachment on freight facilities and the inadequate supply of logistics lands – have their genesis in poor planning. These challenges reflect the fact that freight movement is considered a far lower priority in many planning regimes than residential and commercial development.

Yet, without the ability to move freight efficiently and safety, neither residents nor commercial enterprises will be able to obtain the goods they need to function daily.

Developing a set of National Planning Principles was a key action to emerge from the National Freight and Supply Chain Strategy released last year. Establishing these presents us with an opportunity to achieve a better balance and ensure that freight movement is properly integrated as part of a more nationally consistent approach to planning.

A key outcome flowing from the establishment of National Planning Principles must be to enshrine distinct planning recognition for ‘freight and logistics lands’ within all state and territory planning schemes.

For too long, terms like ‘industrial lands’ or ‘employment lands’ have been used as a ‘catch all’ when discussing non-residential land use, particularly in urban areas.

Yet as our growing population increases demand for land, the application of such broad terms in planning instruments is no longer sufficient to ensure the operational flexibility that those involved in the freight logistics sector require.

For instance, land that is broadly zoned for ‘industrial’ or ‘employment’ purposes may still ultimately allow the establishment of a consumer bulky goods or even retail facilities near a crucial freight facility, such as a port.

The construction and operation of such a facility can give rise to increased traffic congestion on roads that provide the only access to and from freight facilities. This conflicting land use impedes supply chain efficiency and can often also present safety risks.

To prevent the continuation of this scenario, it is important that the National Planning Principles are supported by the development of a National Corridor Protection Strategy.

A consistent national approach to corridor protection is essential to achieving the planning reforms that the freight logistics industry needs. Effective corridor protection not only serves to prevent future community discord over land use; it can also deliver significant savings for taxpayers when it comes to the cost of building infrastructure.

Infrastructure Australia underscored this fact in 2017, when it found that close to $11 billion could be saved on land purchases and construction costs for seven future infrastructure priorities listed on the Infrastructure Priority List if swift action was taken to preserve relevant corridors.

This is also an ideal time to pursue harmonisation of regulations that govern freight movement as it transits across to the continent. To take one example, the 2018 Review of Rail Access Regimes, published by the (then) Department of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development noted there were roughly 150 different environmental regulations that rail operators must comply with when operating rolling-stock between Perth and Brisbane.

Clearly, there are cost savings and other efficiencies to be gained by moving towards a single set of laws across jurisdictions governing environmental regulation, workplace health and safety, workers’ compensation, and drug and alcohol testing for the freight and logistics sector. The new-found spirit of cooperation engendered through the National Cabinet process should now be harnessed to secure that outcome.

In a constrained budgetary atmosphere such as that which is likely to endure for several years in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is even more important that governments drive though low-cost regulatory reforms that will still deliver tangible benefits to the freight and logistics sector, and to the wider community.

In that context, the permanent elimination of operational curfews, promoting better planning and land use outcomes and finally progressing the national harmonisation of state and territory regulations though the development of consistent national approaches to the regulation of freight transport seem like obvious policy priorities for governments to pursue in the remaining months of 2020. ■

The most pressing challenge for logistics is getting stock into stores quickly enough.

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