A meeting in Legco yesterday to resolve a four-month dispute between truck drivers and container terminal operators resulted in a heated slanging-match and desk thumping from a top official.
The truck-drivers have held a series of slow-drive demonstrations and a five-day blockade in recent months to protest against a new $40 cargo-handling fee charged by operators.
During the Legco economic services panel meeting, truckers' representatives were furious over the new charge, which terminal operators imposed on truck drivers but not the shippers who ordered the deliveries.
The parties had earlier reached an agreement to delay the charge, but some terminals broke the pledge and renewed the charge last week.
After hearing a series of criticisms from lawmakers and truck drivers, who accused the Government of not doing enough to solve the crisis, Secretary for Economic Services Sandra Lee Shuk-yee shouted from her seat: 'I am very angry. My office has done so many things over the issue . . . what else can we do? New problems emerge daily, are we going to have to solve them day after day?
'You people should now stop saying we are doing nothing. We are doing everything we can to resolve the crisis. I am getting sick of people saying civil servants are doing nothing,' she said, slamming the desk repeatedly.
