Deliveries of Irish-bound Halloween decorations, DIY materials and heavy machinery could face delays as a two-week dockers’ strike at the port of Liverpool gets underway.
t least 560 workers were due to walk out of the port last night in a dispute over pay, according to the Unite trade union, just hours after Queen Elizabeth’s funeral and the end of a 10-day national mourning period.
The strike will affect the Port of Liverpool’s container division until October 3, although other operations – cruises, trailer traffic and bulk cargo – will be unaffected, the port said in a statement.
Although Liverpool does not handle time-sensitive food or other perishable goods bound for Ireland, it is a hub for goods coming in via container ship from Asia and the United States including goods destined for Irish retailers.
“Any disruption in England has a knock-on impact for Ireland,” said Aidan Flynn, chief executive of the Freight Transport Association of Ireland. “It’s like a concertina effect. Things get squeezed.”
The Liverpool strike comes a week ahead of a planned second walkout at Felixstowe, the UK’s largest container port, which – although not a major hub for Irish goods – could lead to problems further down the supply chain, Mr Flynn said.
He pointed to the ripple effects after the Ever Given container ship, which had a stop at Felixstowe, got stuck in the Suez Canal for a week in March 2021, affecting furniture deliveries to Ireland.
“What we are seeing in Felixstowe, and of course Liverpool, it just adds to further issues in the supply chain.
“Trying to find alternative places to get rerouted just adds costs and delays. They could be products you might be getting for Halloween. A lot of products will have been bought a year in advance, and you could be relying on this product coming from Asia. We don’t want this going any further into the year.”
The Port of Liverpool operates two major container terminals in the city – the Royal Seaforth Container Terminal (RSCT) and Liverpool2 – as well as a concession in Dublin.
The RSCT acts as a feeder port for traffic from India, Africa, South America and the Far East, while Liverpool2 is capable of handling some of the world’s largest container ships.
Freight forwarder Woodland Group Ireland recently estimated that a Liverpool strike “could cause some disruption to the Irish supply chain”, including delays of around a week. Danish shipping giant Maersk said its Irish customers would not be affected as it uses ports in mainland Europe as feeder ports between Ireland and the rest of the world, including the US.
The UK is grappling with double-digit inflation that has eroded living standards and prompted the new government of prime minister Liz Truss to come forward with a mini budget this Friday.
Earlier this month, Liverpool workers rejected an 8.3pc pay rise and a one-off payment, which Unite said amounted to a real-terms pay cut due to soaring prices.
The strikes in Liverpool and Felixstowe will overlap with a rail workers’ strike timed to coincide with the Conservative Party conference in the first week in October.
