Safety on our roads is important, but the pressure on saleyards right now to introduce weighbridges to their facilities is not the right approach.
The Roads and Maritime Service is pushing for this to rein in livestock carriers that might be over weight, especially those from interstate that work on volumetric loading.
This is on top of a push by the RMS for saleyards to also be responsible for fatigue management and that saleyards also ban repeat offenders for overloading.
The National Heavy Vehicle Regulator is the body that is best placed to develop a national, harmonised regulation, or the framework for national legislation.
However, it is still to deliver on the code of practice for moving agricultural machinery that it promised in mid 2016.
The cost of installing these weighbridges is in the vicinity of $2 million, once the road and holding yard infrastructure is included.
If the saleyards were to bear this cost, it would be passed on to producers via saleyard fees.
Meanwhile, all other vehicle weight compliance is handled by the state, using state facilities.
And not all livestock loads are moving through the saleyards, such as farm-to-farm or farm-to abattoir loads, so weighbridges at saleyards wouldn’t capture all the potential infringements.
This is just an example of the state government passing the buck back to local government and local business.
It is also potentially yet another cost producers don’t need, albeit indirectly.
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A lot of livestock carriers move interstate and they are the backbone of trade in our pastoral economy, so rather than singularly target the saleyards, the state government needs to be proactive in a more holistic approach.
Given the size, weight and number of trucks on the road, it is understandable why the RMS targets the industry with regard to road safety.
But some of the ideas are clearly not practical, a similar example being the fining of livestock transporters if a bit manure flings out of a truck.
As for also expecting the saleyards to then ban truck companies that are found to be repeat offenders for being overweight from their facilities is ridiculous.
The saleyards are not the regulators.
This is another example of red tape and cost being forced on an industry that is increasingly being made less competitive.
