KEY POINTS:
Truckies are not ruling out more mass protests, although they hope a working party on road user charges will make enough progress to prevent further disruption.
A promise on Thursday night by Transport Minister Annette King of a working party including industry representatives to examine the formula for setting road charges came too late to stop thousands of trucks disrupting traffic in cities and towns throughout New Zealand yesterday.
But it was followed after the protest by a preliminary meeting between Road Transport Forum chief executive Tony Friedlander and acting Secretary for Transport Wayne Donnelly.
Mr Friedlander said Mr Donnelly had agreed to prepare details including proposed terms of reference for the working party for another meeting next week, so these could be finalised with Ms King when she returns from overseas on July 14.
He said that although setting up the working party properly and agreeing on its terms of reference was essential, the forum would be "looking for timely progress".
"Our industry has clearly shown that we will not tolerate a drawn-out process," he said. "It is in everyone's interest to have a fair and efficient charging regime for the road transport industry in place as soon as possible."
But Mr Friedlander said his members would reserve the right to hold more protests if that did not happen, given the strength of feeling against the sudden imposition of road user charge rises.
Ms King has said she resisted a recommendation by officials to raise charges by double the increase imposed on Tuesday, and wanted to examine the formula for setting these, to ensure all road users paid their fair share of maintaining and building roads, and improving public transport.
Mr Friedlander denied that prior planning had gone into yesterday's protests. Auckland Road Transport Association representative Chris Carr acknowledged that some thought was given to organising a protest several months ago, when diesel prices started biting, but these were acknowledged as not something for which the Government could be held accountable.
But the imposition of road charge increases under a flawed formula, without giving the industry a chance to prepare to pass these on to customers, was another matter.
Transport association northern president Mike Herrick said his members were protesting on behalf of the public as well because "everything you see, use, eat and drink comes in a truck".Mathew Dearnaley
