{"id":11922,"date":"2026-02-13T14:00:26","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T14:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/11922\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T14:00:26","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T14:00:26","slug":"some-importers-have-slashed-freight-bill-after-ferry-deal-minister-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/11922\/","title":{"rendered":"Some importers have “slashed” freight bill after ferry deal, Minister claims"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are major importers bringing \u201cvast quantities\u201d of goods to the island who have \u201cslashed\u201d their freight bills following the introduction of a flat-rate card as part of the government\u2019s 20-year agreement with DFDS, the Economic Development Minister has claimed.<\/p>\n

Deputy Kirsten Morel \u2013 who earlier this month was forced to fend off calls for an inquiry from major retailer Morrisons which claimed to have been left with a budget gap of up to \u00a3400,000<\/a> \u2013 told States Members today that importers \u201cnow see that they can operate supply chain differently and in a competitive manner\u201d.<\/p>\n

During this morning\u2019s sitting, the Minister faced several questions over DFDS\u2019s flat-rate freight charge, which marked a significant change from the volume-based discounts Condor had offered and has drawn criticism from some retailers.<\/a><\/p>\n

But Deputy Morel said that a flat-rate card \u201cprovides a safe and investable ferry service\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"\"Pictured: Deputy Kirsten Morel said that \u201cthe flat-rate card puts competition into the correct part of the supply chain\u201d.<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cThis is my priority as Minister for Sustainable Economic Development, because the ferry service is the single most important part of the supply chain.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe flat-rate card puts competition into the correct part of the supply chain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Deputy Morel explained: \u201cInstead of the ferry service \u2013 the most important part of that supply chain \u2013 being beaten down on cost and price, competition will henceforth take place in the freight-forwarding part of the supply chain.\u201d<\/p>\n

He stated that the freight-forwarding element accounted for 60% of the cost of delivering goods to Jersey. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt is appropriate that competition takes place in that majority part of the supply chain, rather than the minority part, the single point of failure that is the ferry service.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Pictured: DFDS freight and passenger ship Stena Vinga.<\/p>\n

Deputy Karen Wilson asked whether the Treasury Department or Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority were consulted on \u201cpotential market effects of the policy\u201d and how any \u201cmeasurable improvements\u201d in market competition would be monitored.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t believe Treasury were asked,\u201d Deputy Morel answered, though he said the JCRA were asked about competition impacts \u201cand whether it would be an appropriate mechanism from the competition perspective\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is quite clear to me that the reaction that we are seeing at the moment suggests that the flat-rate card is indeed having the appropriate effect,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that there are importers to this island who have slashed the rate, their bills, for freight to this island. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd by importers, I mean major importers who bring in vast quantities of goods to this island, because they now see that they can operate supply chain differently and in a competitive manner, so they are not beholden to the dominant supplier keeping them over a barrel.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There are major importers bringing \u201cvast quantities\u201d of goods to the island who have \u201cslashed\u201d their freight bills…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11923,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[6052],"tags":[6057,4858,6201,673],"class_list":["post-11922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dfds","tag-dfds","tag-freight","tag-kirsten-morel","tag-supply-chain"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11922"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11922\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}