Fastway closure 'devastating' - Laois road haulier and president of IRHA

The Laois man who is president of the Irish Road Hauliers Association has called the receivership of Fastway Courier's parent company as "devastating" for its employees, and the wider courier community across Ireland.

Ger Hyland, of Hyland Transport in Rosenallis, blamed Government policy for the loss of jobs at the company which had a base in Portarlington on the Laois Offaly border.

"Our members are subcontracted to Fastway, some are on the hook for €100,000 plus. Their work has gone. They're all rural based hauliers, all working on very small, tight margins. They travel from all over Ireland to Portarlington every night where the main hub was. They were delivering and collecting freight for their own areas. 

"Fastway has gone but it's not alone 300 jobs lost, the subcontractors that have small vans, their livelihood is all gone here. They're all owned quite significant monies as well. They all have repayments on vans. Eight weeks from Christmas, it really is a devastating time," said Mr Hyland on RTÉ's News at One.

He doubts if the subcontractors have hope of getting their money back.

"It will depend on what the liquidator has left to divvy out between what people are owed. It appears there wasn't much there for anybody.

"We really need the Government to step up and help our industry. We're three weeks past the budget where our industry got absolutely nothing only 2 cent more carbon tax on our fuel," said Mr Hyland.

There are some 50,000 parcels awaiting delivery by Fastway whose staff were told they would not be paid from now on and only come to work if they were requested to do so.

RTÉ reported that the parent company Nuvion says  "delays and disruption are envisaged" but the parcels are hoped to be all delivered within coming days.  The company had lost two big clients this year, Asos and Sports Direct.

It blamed "sustained inflation, rising operation costs and price pressures".

Mr Hyland has also said that the Fastway closure could be followed by other companies going under.

"It won’t be long before there are hundreds of haulage companies entering receivership leading to thousands of job losses, undelivered goods and a devastating impact on the Irish economy," he said.

Mr Hyland described it as a body blow to an industry that is already on its knees and said this is the start of a domino effect of closures in the transport industry.  

READ ALSO: Threat to Laois jobs devastating says local councillor

“We sat down with party leaders and explained what would happen if we did not get support. So this government cannot say they were not warned about what happened today with Fastway couriers.

“We are the wheels that make the Irish economy turn but those wheels are coming off now. I hope that when the media are interviewing politicians about the hundreds of job losses at Fastway and the knock on impact on rural Ireland, they will ask the government why they didn’t listen to the haulage industry who warned of impending closures," he said.

Mr Hyland called on the government to provide an immediate support package to the transport and haulage industry to try and stave off the worst of the impending closures.