Sustainable Transport and the Environment Guide - Unite the Union

Road transport is also the most widespread source of noise, which again not only has
an impact on local residents, but also on the drivers, resulting in hearing losses. As
both noise and congestion increases the truck driver’s level of stress also increases
significantly.
So, it has to be remembered that the environmental problems caused by road transport
are closely linked to health and safety of professional drivers and other transport
workers.
To tackle these environmental challenges, several environmental measures need to be
undertaken such as improved infrastructure, cleaner and alternative fuels as well as
cleaner and technologically advanced vehicles are required.
However, in regards to the increased use of bio fuels in the road transport sector, it
has to be taken into consideration where these fuels come from and whether they are
produced from sustainable resources. Furthermore, products are often transported
long distances across Europe and it is questionable whether some of these transport
flows are needed and could be avoided.
At the moment, the full internalisation of external environmental costs of road freight
transport is not taken into account, although pricing/ taxation policies could help to
get rid of any unfair cost advantages that road transport may have over other forms of
transport, and also help to make the end consumers more aware of the environmental
cost of what they buy. However, we have to be careful that increased costs do not
impact on workers but are paid for by the end users.
In the majority of EU Member States, freight transport by road employs a third to half
of all people working in the transport sector. In total, more than 2.7m workers are
employed in road freight transport in the EU-27.
According to Jan – Mar 2008 Labour Force Survey there are 293,981 employed LGV
drivers in the UK. The Road Transport Commercial Trade Group membership in
March 2008 was 69,126. However, there are a significant number of LGV drives in
other trade groups of the T&G Section of Unite the Union.
Due to the restructuring in the sector and the emergence of logistics, new jobs have
been created, in particular with warehousing operators. But only a small number of
these are covered by specific collective agreements.
Furthermore, 3PL companies increasingly exploit the possibilities of an internal
transport market using the huge wage gap between professional LGV drivers of the
new and old Member States. As a result, they employ cheaper labour from new
Member States through cabotage and cross trade. Such situation by no means helps to
improve the overall working conditions in the sector or create sustainable
employment.
The completion of the European internal market in 1992 but also the dynamics of
globalisation and the development of information technology (IT) has been the
catalyst for considerable restructuring in the road freight transport sector, especially
the growth of 3PLs.
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