Last night Portugal’s fuel-tanker drivers voted to call off an indefinite strike. Their union ANTRAM said they were open to government-moderated negotiations, but only if the strike was suspended or called off. A meeting is scheduled for Tuesday 20th August, to resume negotiations.
National Hazardous Goods Drivers’ Union (SNMMP) started striking on Monday 12th August, demanding better salaries and working conditions after negotiations with their employers’ association ANTRAM failed. It was their second strike this year.
During the strike, motorists were limited to buying up to 15 litres (4 gallons) of petrol at special filling stations. The Algarve was the hardest hit, with popular tourist filled areas of the region running out of fuel on Thursday. However no major problems were reported at the country’s airports.
Comments
We also have toll roads which locals avoid like the plague as foreign cars can be exempt.
What are the government doing with all this money - it needs investigating.
Give the drivers a decent wage - to interfere with supply of fuel defeats the objective given the excessive revenue it contributes.
More than half of what we pay in fuel is tax ISP and IVA. Distributors get under 10%. So if you pay 1.35 per litre of diesel and remove all the taxes including the criminal CO2 tax you pay around 0.60 per litre of diesel of which less than 0.06 goes for distribution. Very small margins, but I agree that these truck drivers should get better pay.
As a hard core capitalist, my opinion is that you can't get an economy going by paying peanuts; with the low wages paid to workers here, they have nothing left to spend after essentials.
That means lower tax revenue too.
And we pay among the highest fuel prices in the world; how is it we have suck lowly paid truck drivers?