<> . "93" . "93" . "17" . "Update No 8 28th July 2008" . "Hi All, The shutdown is proving to be a success in terms of numbers, and I believe that the numbers will improve over the next 24 hours. The suggestion that we don't take safety seriously is just a poor attempt to label the industry as irresponsible, nothing could be further from the truth, that is an insult to hard working people in the road transport industry. The fatigue laws in the National Road Transport Reform Bill is a smoke screen to justify the money grab in the name of safety, the reason I say that is we are not seeing any real changes in the actual driving hours we have now or how they are applied, except that there will be substantial increases in fines and the addition of demerit points for breaches on log book entries, in Queensland they have applied breaches for administrative errors that don’t relate to safety, that will soon apply in other states from the 29th of Sept 2008. Reports coming in today suggest that we have achieved our 60% starting goal if we maintain that level the impact will take place soon. This shutdown will be our last chance to head off the injustice’s being perpetuated on the whole transport industry, the extra charges will add more hardship to an already struggling transport sector and the fatigue laws gives enforcement more tools to harass drivers. The main focus for the rest of the week will be on getting a meeting with the ministers, I will be staying in Brisbane for a couple more days. Our delegates in the other states are reporting reduced truck traffic and are confident of a greater reduction in coming days, it’s all good. I happen to know that we will have a better line of communication with the Government than the other groups. Until next time Mick Pattel " . "2008-07-28T12:46:54Z"^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime . "2008-07-28T21:24:01Z"^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#dateTime . "1" . "1" . "1" .