Details of Progress on 2005 Position
Statements
Ten Position Statements were endorsed at the ALC’s Annual
Forum in February 2005. These drew on the recommendations of
the Australian Logistics Industry Strategy (ALIS) and set the
priorities and the work agenda for 2005. At the ALC quarterly
meeting in Sydney on 26 August 2005 a new Position Statement
7 on Infrastructure was endorsed. This incorporated Position
Statement 8 - Inland Standard Gauge Rail that was previously
a stand-alone statement.
The Position Statements:
- Clearly identified the objective of the problem to be tackled
(defined the problem)
- Established the policy position of ALC on key strategic issues
- Linked current work to the original recommendation from the
Australian Logistics Industry Strategy (ALIS)
- Recognised and gave full credit for work that was already
underway in the particular area, and
- Established clear actions to be taken by ALC and others in
2005-2006 to address the issue.
1/05 Occupational Health and Safety
The objectives:
- To heighten industry and the public awareness of the issue.
- To recognise and promote success to the public and the logistics
industry.
- To encourage adoption of these successful practices in logistics.
- To win government support for these actions.
General
Progress on OH&S has occurred in two ways
- A National OH&S Summit is programmed for Sydney
early in 2006. This will include:
- Reports on Australian and International case studies
- Endorsement of actions to raise the profile and level of
priority being given to OH&S issues
- Endorsement of an ALC National Charter on OH&S that will
invite organisations to ‘sign on’ to graduated
efforts on OH&S , and
- Information on the bottom line benefits available to companies
that achieve better OH&S results.
- Operating Guidelines for retail logistics have been
drafted and are targeted for initial trial in March 2006. These
guidelines are for adoption by all those in the supply chain
supporting grocery retailing in Australia across all transport
modes. It will be a major step in ensuring that firms meet
their obligations under the various State Chain of Responsibility
requirements.
Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
1/05/1 |
Identify case studies of
successful work in OH&S in the Logistics sector. This
should include examples of firms tackling specific tough
issues such as drugs and alcohol |
Underway - Case studies will
be an important part of the OH&S Summit early in 2006.
ALC has had a number of meetings and is having ongoing
meetings with DEWR to ensure that this is progressed consistent
with their National OH&S Strategy. DEWR has provided
financial support for the Summit. |
1/05/2 |
Evaluate case studies and
develop a report on the best practices (possible through
the assistance of NOHSC, now renamed the Office of Australian
Safety and Compensation, within DEWR.) |
Underway - As above |
1/05/3 |
Promote these best practices
in a National Summit on OH&S (possibly through a
co-sponsorship of a conference with another group) |
Underway – Summit early
2006 |
1/05/4 |
Publish the results of
the summit in a leaflet to raise the awareness, to promote
and to educated the public and industry |
Underway - Outcomes of National
OH&S Summit will be collated and published. In particular,
an ALC National OH&S Charter is proposed to encourage
firms to ‘sign on’ to the national effort. |
1/05/5 |
Collect and publish levels
of achievement for the logistics industry |
Underway - Steps towards meeting
this objective will be made as part of the Charter ‘sign
on’ initiative. The Data Working Group has
also identified the need to collect and publish industry
specific information as part of their ‘Data Pyramid’. |
1/05/6 |
ALC to encourage the development
of an industry accreditation system as the best approach
to improving safety levels. |
Underway - As above |
1/05/7 |
Establish a Lobby group
to promote improved OH&S regulations and practices |
Complete - ALC has established
an OH&S Working Group for this purpose. The Group is
chaired by Ian Murray. |
1/05/8 |
Review Outcome of the Nation
Summit to identify additional studies to support the
industry’s drive for a better OH&S record |
Underway - Summit programmed. |
1/05/9 |
Consider the notion of
a safety culture in transport and logistics and work
with others, including the Transport and Logistics Centre
(TALC), to define the behavioural and other characteristics
of such a culture. |
Underway - Safety culture to
be investigated and promoted through the development of
the Charter. Discussions with TALC continue. |
1/05/10 |
Work with the TALC to develop
a learning pathway in transport safety management to
improve the capacity of managers and other staff to address
safety and health issues at all levels. |
Underway - To be considered
at the National Summit |
1/05/11 |
State Governments confirm
recognition of their responsibilities and commit to work
closely with the industry to improve safety levels |
Not an ALC action - Action
for the State Governments. |
2/05 Education and Training
The objectives:
- To encourage a national approach to education and training
- To support the development of a national web portal to provide
details of potential education and training providers
- To create a forum for the interchange of ideas and new education
products
- To work with other group to develop and extend education
and training products
- To establish mechanisms to improve the movement of students
between the vocational and tertiary education sectors.
- To review education and training funding and to ensure funding
sources are fully utilised.
General
ALC and its People Steering Group have been active in the debate
on education and training and have promoted the basic tenants
for success in this area as being that education and training
must:
- Be nationally available
- Articulate careers and education
- Refer to all modes
- Be multidisciplinary
Specific actions by ALC in this area in 2005 have included:
- Support for Smart 2005 (Sydney) and Freight 2005 (Melbourne),
in particular the Education and Training streams.
- Participation and support for the ARA Rail Skills and Careers
Council
- National meeting of senior academics in Sydney on 16 November
2005.
Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
2/05/1 |
Continue to work with other
groups including TALC, TDT, Australasian Railway Association
(ARA), and Australian Trucking Association (ATA) and
so on, to improve the education products |
Complete - Professor Rod Troutbeck,
Chairman of the ALC People Steering Group, Hal Morris,
Ian Murray and other members of the group have met with
and had ongoing dialogue with ATA, ARA, ASA, SAL, ASA,
TALC, TDT, NTA, CBFCA, AFIF and many other organisations
with an interest in Education and Training |
2/05/2 |
Continue support for work
to establish effective national web portals to provide
information about courses that support Logistics, including
the Transport Integrated Learning Information System
(TILIS) being developed through the TALC |
Underway - ALC has continued
to support the work of TALC although this work has been
slower than originally anticipated. These delays have recently
been resolved. Hal Morris and other ALC members are
on the TALC Industry Advisory Board and progress is now
being made on agreed TALC priorities.
Hal Morris is also a member of the TILIS Advisory Group that
met in Sydney on 18 November 2005 |
2/05/3 |
Collate education and training
issues from industry groups and develop a position paper
for national funding requirements |
Not yet started - It is understood
that TALC is soon to start work to catalogue and publish
available education and training provision. Once the cataloguing
is complete (late November), a summary can be prepared
and published.
Not yet started - The development of a discussion paper on
funding requirements has not yet started. |
2/05/4 |
Promote and discuss these
ideas with a National Summit on Education and Training |
Complete - National education
and skills summit have been held as part of Smart 2005
in Sydney and Freight 2005 in Melbourne. ALC has
been an active industry partner and has worked closely
with the organisers of these events and has not sought
to duplicate them. |
2/05/5 |
Seek support from governments
to fund additional education and training initiatives.
(This may require collaboration with SCOT) |
Not yet started. |
2/05/6 |
Establish greater co-operation
of Universities in a region to collaborate on Logistics
education and research, supported by the TALC programs. |
Underway - A major national
meeting was held on 16 November 2005 to address this issue. |
3/05 Careers in Logistics
The objectives:
- To identify and implement processes which will retain the
industry’s knowledge base.
- To raise the profile of a career in the industry
- To establish new methods to retain knowledge in the industry
General
This has been an area in which ALC has committed significant
time and resources and has achieved major success in 2005.
ALC has provided leadership at the national level and has built
on the work of approximately 50 organisations from across transport
and logistics (T&L) to improve the general knowledge and
understanding of T&L and to encourage people to pursue
careers in logistics. This has included the establishment of
a National Careers Working Group, distribution and sharing
of existing support material and production of new DVD and
printed support material, advertising on behalf of the T&L
industry in magazines, newspapers and online, and working with
local groups to have a T&L presence at major Career Expos
in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart.
We have plans to build on the success next year and have received
commitment from TALC for seed funding to support this initiative.
Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
3/05/1 |
Continue to work with other
groups including TALC, TDT, ARA, and ATA and so on, to
improve the image of a career in the sector |
Complete - ALC has an active
and positive relationship with TALC, TDT, ASA, SAL, ARA,
ATA etc. For example, TDT used our quarterly Council meeting
in Brisbane, 10 June and the presence of then Deputy Prime
Minister to launch its Equity guidelines policy. |
3/05/2 |
Establish a working group
to develop process to enable staff close to retiring
to educate others. This may be through postgraduate courses |
Complete - ALC has established
a National Careers Working Group to guide this process.
We have also participated in the TALC mentoring process
and Jessica Brocklebank of ALC is a member of the TALC
Mentoring Reference Group. |
3/05/3 |
Identify and evaluate case
studies of innovation in sections of the Transport and
Logistics sector in conjunction with the TALC programs |
Complete - This action is addressed
under Position Statement 6/05 ‘Innovation’. |
3/05/4 |
Promote these best practices
in a National Summit on innovation |
Not supported - As above |
3/05/5 |
Publish the results to
raise the awareness to promote the industry |
Complete - As above. |
4/05 Security and Logistics
The Objective:
To work with Governments and industry and lead the development
of cost effective mechanisms that will secure the supply chain
General
Work on security so far in 2005 has initially included significant
activity assisting government with advice on industry requirements
and implications for the new legislation. ALC is now waiting
to see the draft of this legislation so that it can work on
implementation. In the meantime, ALC has:
- Regularly spoken at conferences and workshops raising awareness
of security issues
- Liaised with NTC and others
- Met with the Federal Minister and written to the Prime Minister
on these issues, and
- Agreed to join with the ATA on the steering committee to
run a pilot of the ‘alert’ system.
Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
4/05/1 |
Work with all parties to
introduce as a top priority a new HCDG regulatory regime
supported by a national IT and training/education system |
Underway - ALC has continued
to be active in working with government and in raising
industry awareness through conferences etc |
4/05/2 |
Engage NTC/SCOT as well
as ATA and ARA on increasing security of the supply chain |
Underway - ALC is in ongoing
contact with NTC, ASA, SAL, ARA, ATA and others focused
on ensuring there is appropriate security in the supply
chain |
4/05/3 |
Work with DOTARS to establish
a logistics industry alert system (similar to the existing “frontline” strategy) |
Underway - ALC has agreed to
join ATA and DOTARS on the steering committee for the pilot
of a logistics industry alert system |
4/05/4 |
In addition to a security “frontline” strategy,
adopt the Customs accredited client system as a model
to enhance supply chain security |
Complete - ALC has been active
in promoting CMR as a model |
4/05/5 |
Ensure Australian logistics
security arrangements are consistent, as far as possible,
with international arrangements |
Underway - ALC Security Steering
Group Chairman, David Williams OAM has been very active
in encouraging consistency with international arrangements
and consistency between states in Australia.
We have also been working closely with Customs on the ‘single
window’ project |
4/05/6 |
The Commonwealth and the
States work to ensure that do ‘disconnect’ in
jurisdiction exists, particularly in regard to responsibility |
Not an ALC action - As above |
5/05 Official Statistics
The objectives:
To enable the analysis of industry characteristics and trends
for the purposes of policy formulation, strategic business decision-making,
infrastructure planning and other investments.
General
ALC has formed a National Logistics Industry Data Working Group
to tackle this objective. The group has agreed on their objectives
and on the purpose for data collection. Action is now progressing
on the initial steps on their action plan.
Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
5/05/1 |
The ALC Executive to commission
a research project to investigate, report and make recommendations
by the end of 2005 on
- Available data
- Required data
- The gap between these two
- Steps needed to fill this gap
|
Underway - This research is
part of the initial work endorsed by the group and will
be completed by mid 2006. A consultancy tender brief
has been endorsed and Sd+D consulting have been appointed. |
5/05/2 |
As a subset of the above,
consider statistics on the economic contribution of the
freight logistics industry in Australia, the percentage
of outsourcing, employment in the industry, number of
3PL verses 4PL, and so on. This would essentially
update Chapter 2 of the National Freight Strategy (the
report titled “Freight Logistics in Australia – an
Agenda for Action”) |
Complete - The agreed needs
for data (the questions to be answered) are:
- Define and quantify logistics
- Report on performance and recommend improvements
from the perspective of:
- Each transport mode
- By supply chain
- By geography including … freight, domestic
freight and international freight
- Inform detailed management decisions e.g. investment,
training, OH&S, security etc
|
5/05/3 |
Consult with all interested
parties including Australian Bureau of Statistics to
seek their support and action |
Complete - ABS has been consulted
and have joined the data working group |
5/05/4 |
Consider the research recommendations
and develop an implementation plan |
Underway - The working group
will update its action plan on receipt of the information
from these initial steps |
6/05 Innovation
The objectives:
ALC works across all divides in logistics, between industry and
government, between levels of government, and between competitors
at an industry level. This means that ALC is ideally positioned
to create ways in which this innovative knowledge can be shared
for the good of the industry and for Australia’s competitive
position internationally.
General
The focus of ALC on innovation has been a major priority in 2005.
The primary activity has been driven by the ALC User Steering
Group. This has been the completion of a consultancy conducted
by Lucis Pty Ltd to collect, record, evaluate and publish a
small number of case studies and to build a ‘Logistics
Innovation Toolkit’ drawing on the lessons learned.
This project has culminated in:
- A major report published on the ALC website
- An HTML and CD-ROM interactive version published on CD and
the web
- A 20-page printed summary of the studies and the findings
- Stand-alone case study summaries
- An ‘Innovation Readiness Checklist’, and
- A ‘Logistics Innovation Toolkit’.
A proposal for a next stage of this work is under review. This
stage, if it proceeds, would include the further development
and road testing of the toolkit at ten workshops around Australia
and the further development and promotion of the web-based support
tool.
| Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
6/05/1 |
Continued focus by the
user group on establishing innovative logistics practices
for public and ALC consumption |
Complete - User Steering Group
has led the continued actions to build capacity to innovate
in logistics |
6/05/2 |
Engage a consultant to
design and implement arrangements for capturing and communicating
innovation using case studies |
Complete - Lucis Pty Ltd (Principal
Consultant – Robert Ogulin) won a competitive tender
and delivered a good result on time and within budget |
6/05/3 |
Consultant will interview
volunteering firms and write material (rather than asking
firms to do these themselves) |
Complete - Lucis conducted
interviews and research and then documented each case study.
The case studies were then reviewed by an independent editor |
6/05/4 |
Mechanisms to ensure anonymity
and to protect competitively sensitive information will
be built into this process |
Complete - All case studies
and the report findings were returned to the relevant companies
for comment and final approval before publication. |
7/05 Infrastructure – AusLink
The objective: To secure a central role
for the ALC in industry consultation on AusLink
General
A reformed and reinvigorated ALC Infrastructure Steering Group
has led steps for ALC to fulfil its role as a key conduit for
industry advice to government on AusLink and more generally on
infrastructure priorities. Actions have included:
- Participation in meetings and in the AusLink consultation
workshop convened by DOTARS in April 2005
- Verbal and written submissions to the Prime Ministers Taskforce
Investigating Infrastructure blockages.
- Verbal and written submissions to the Senate committee reviewing
the AusLink legislation
- Conference speakers and press releases on strategic Infrastructure
issues, including AusLink, and
- Completion of the design of the industry consultation process
based on recommendations from a consultancy from Des Powell.
This Position Statement was amended at the ALC quarterly Council
meeting in Sydney on 26 August to incorporate 8/05 Inland Standard
Gauge Rail.
| Number |
Action |
2005 Progress |
7/05/1 |
A small, senior group of
Council members will meet with Minister Anderson on 10
March 2005 to seek his agreement to ALC playing this
role. |
Complete - Meeting with Minister
Anderson was held in Canberra on 10 March 2005. Discussions
at that meeting and subsequent correspondence confirmed
ALC’s role as a key conduit for advise from industry
to government on AusLink.
Met with Minister Truss on 30 November 2005 |
7/05/2 |
ALC to establish consultative
mechanisms (recommendation 33) to make sure that its
advice is sound and represents the requirements of the
logistics industry |
Underway - Des Powell has now
completed his consultancy. His recommendations include:
- Set a national agenda – establish a leadership
group to meet regularly with Ministers to confirm discussion
on a strategic agenda for logistics. Also, engage Freight
Councils and Industry Peak bodies in developing a shared
agenda.
- Engage SCOT and ATC – follow up on the invitation
from Mike Taylor to raise key strategic issues with
SCOT and ATC.
- Build a research capability?
- Advise directly on AusLink – establish an AusLink
Working Group under the Infrastructure Steering Group
to advise DOTARS on AusLink priorities.
- This work is now being followed up as part of developing
infrastructure priorities for the ALC to promote.
|
8/05 Inland Standard Gauge Rail
General
ALC activity in this area has been focused on supporting DOTARS
and ARA in investigating this issue as part of the North-South
Corridor Study. Specific actions have included:
- Regular reviews and discussions of the need for this initiative
at ALC meetings
- Inclusion of the initiative in conference presentations and
ALC press releases as a National priority.
This Position Statement has now been included in the revised
Statement on Infrastructure endorsed by ALC in August 2005 and
will therefore no longer be considered as a stand-alone issue.
9/05 Environmental Performance
Environmental performance has continued to be considered at Infrastructure
Steering Group meeting and at ALC quarterly meetings however
interest and commitment from industry has been limited. Adoption
of ISO14001 has been slow but steady (according to our MOU
partner, SAI Global). ALC endorsement of the environmental
standards through ISO14001 has been profiled in press reports
and in a major article in ‘Global Standards’ magazine.
There are some firms which are not able for various reasons
to agree to the adoption of the standard, which requires on-going
audit. However these firms have indicated a willingness to adopt
an environmental charter. A draft environmental charter has been
agreed for discussion purposes, with the intention of being adopted
by the industry generally, and indicating the industry’s
commitment to sustainable operations. In addition the standard
would be promoted for adoption by those firms which are able
to commit to its requirements and it is anticipated that progress
in terms of the number of firms adopting ISO14001 will continue.
10/05 Communication Standards
While general work on the adoption of EAN.UCC Open Global standards
for communication has been limited, some specific actions have
progressed in 2005. These include:
- Conference speaking engagements by ALC members and ALC endorsement
of relevant conferences on RFID and EAN.UCC
- Progress on the ITOL funded ‘Proof of Concept’ project
|
