'AFR Weekend' on Saturday 18 March 2023 will have a long article...

'AFR Weekend' on Saturday 18 March 2023 will have a long article on why Scott's Refrigerated Transport folded. Too lengthy to reproduce here, so buy the paper if interested.

I have never worked in logistics and transport but key messages may have been:

(a) pay careful attention to contractual clauses
(b) don't attempt to upgrade ageing IT networks just before Christmas if it's your busiest time
(c) the two fatalities Scott's had meant bureaucrats at the National Road Transport Commission paid especial attention to the company
(d) continual investment in fleet renewal is essential, but Scott's had an ageing truck fleet it was the QAN of road (and railable containers) transport
(e) if stored (loaded) pallet numbers significantly rise to an unusually high level, it's very hard to reduce the figure if an event out of left field such as a so-called 'pandemic' occurs (this struck me as stating the obvious).

In short, once Scott's started having difficulties, revitalisation and survival became difficult and soon impossible.

You'd hope LAU would ask itself the same questions and have answers to them as part of its worst case operating scenarios, but again, the Board and management know more about freight than I can ever hope to.