Australia: Truckies in noisy protest

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Australia: Truckies in noisy protest

By Nina Field and Katharine Murphy

Hundreds of truck drivers on Friday quit building sites across Melbourne to protest over high fuel prices and poor pay.

The tip-truck and quarry owner-drivers staged a noisy rally in their vehicles outside the Victorian Parliament, before voting to stay off the job until Monday night, when a meeting has been scheduled with industry leaders to help resolve issues over low cartage rates in the face of mounting petrol costs.

Friday's trucking protests came as Queensland farm groups held separate protests outside the electorate offices of Coalition MPs in a bid to keep up pressure over high fuel prices.

The Opposition Leader, Mr Kim Beazley, revived his attack on the Government, saying it was unprepared to revise its post-GST petrol tax arrangements and would use the tax windfall to fund pork barrelling at the next election.

"What's involved here is the creation of a Liberal Party war chest ... and I do think that the average punter would probably take the view that [the windfall] is better in his back pocket," Mr Beazley told Radio 6PR.

http://7am.com/cgi-bin/wireclicker.cgi?http://www.afr.com.au/news/20001007/A36231-2000Oct6.html

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), October 07, 2000


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