The GRTU, chamber of small and medium enterprises, yesterday described the situation regarding the inter-island carriage of cargo containers as totally unacceptable .

GRTU director general Vince Farrugia, told a news conference that Gozo traders and cargo haulers involved in the matter were being treated as second class citizens of the Gozo Channel Co.

Gozo traders already faced difficulties because cargo reached them at double the costs, having first to be unloaded in Malta and then carried to Gozo.Then again, the ferry service from Sa Maison could not be worse. Some years ago it ran daily, but was cut down to three times a week some time later. Now it runs twice a week, and the service operates only when a ferry is available.

Mr Farrugia said there was a period when, for one reason or another, the ferry did not make it to Sa Maison for four weeks. On some occasions, like this week, bad weather ruled out the service, but then the service did not operate when the weather improved, but on the day it was scheduled to. On Wednesday there was no service from Sa Maison – now the Gozo Channel Co, because it wants the ferry to run when it is supposed to, which happens to be next Monday.

There are already containers and trucks parked at Sa Maison, which are enough for two ferry crossings, Mr Farrugia said. Many are essential products, such as animal feed, flour, sugar, tomatoes and other agricultural products, together with construction industry orders and other products.

The situation is not acceptable, Mr Farrugia said. The Sa Maison service is a duty for Gozo Channel which it can not avoid. The GRTU said it is not acceptable for the Gozo Channel Co. to argue that the company’s main duty is to carry passengers and not cargo.

Mr Farrugia went on to announce, at the end of the news conference, that its protest was having an effect because the Gozo Channel’s chairman had just informed him that he would be conceding an extra crossing that very evening. He thanked the chairman and said that while ad hoc solutions were acceptable they were not real solutions. The government should intervene in the matter and find a permanent solution.

If Gozo Channel could not operate the service, the government should liberalise the sector, he said.