Overbearing OH&S rules

Farm cattle and sheepyards are already on the hit list of Work Safe, as was mentioned last year in the Stock & Land.

To refresh your memories, it related to the design of stockyards to make sure they were safe for farmers, employees and carriers.

However, the new - or not so new - issue relates to accessibility for livestock transport.

While this will not be an issue for many larger producers who have bigger properties and are already compliant, many hundreds, or even thousands of properties will have to spend hard earned money to make changes.

No longer will trucks be allowed to reverse into a farm stockyard off a public road, when the new regulations are implemented and enforced.

Imagine redesigning your current situation, taking a swathe out of a paddock, altering, or re-building your yards, and putting in a suitable track as well.

Why is this a big concern? Well speaking for myself, it will cost not only the loss of grazing space, but thousands of dollars to implement.

If you consider as you drive around your area, how many loading yards facilities are located at the edge of the road, partly due to the age of the facility, but also due to ease of planning many years ago.

For OH&S reasons, it can be dangerous when reversing off a road, both for the truck driver and for the vehicle travelling along the road.

Trucks are getting bigger and bigger, and to cope with these vehicles, changes to facilities add up to dollars. But what else is in the wind for livestock transport?

As of July 1, new regulations for B-Double trucks will come into place. These trucks will have to be fitted with some sort of scales as they will not be allowed to be more than 68 tonnes fully loaded.

While this will not affect loads of younger cattle, as it would not be possible to overload, bullocks could be an issue.

As bullocks are taller and carry much more weight than their younger brothers and sisters, it is easy to go above 68t, which does currently occur.

It will be most likely that B-Doubles will be under-utilised in these circumstances, the end result will be higher freight costs as more trucks will be needed to transport stock.

While most of this will affect processors, we all know who ends up paying.

Another issue is the enforcement of working times for truck drivers.

When a driver travels to a saleyard, or a property to load livestock, time spent loading stock is included in the total allowed by regulation.

Victorian Livestock Rural Transport Association president John Beer said it was imperative saleyards and abattoirs had loading facilities suitable for B-Doubles.

This means a moveable platform that winches up to the top deck and allows for easy movement of livestock, on and off the truck.

"There are too few facilities offering this form of loading race, and at some yards it can take hours to load a B-Double," he said.

This extra time spent loading stock takes away from the time on the road for the driver, which would see many drivers parked away from home for many hours.

This can be managed if there are two drivers for long hauls, or a second driver at one end of the journey, but it all costs.

Re-building farm yards, constructing new loading races, and fewer livestock in some circumstances, all adds up to extra freight charges.

So far both sides of the industry have been fairly lucky and have seen little changes in freight costs, but complying with Work Safe regulations and the new weight regulations for trucks will all land back on the producer at some stage.