A PREFERRED BIDDER is expected to be announced this month for the sale of Australia’s National Rail Corp and New South Wales’ FreightCorp. The joint trade sale was launched with a call for expressions of interest on September 4, following a formal announcement by the federal government and the state governments of New South Wales and Victoria on August 24. The sale is due to be completed by December 31, raising between A$1bn and A$2bn.
Favoured bidder is a consortium of transport firm Toll Holdings and the logistics group Lang Corp, which owns rail freight operator Patrick Stevedores. Toll is already NRC’s biggest customer, and has previously expressed interest in FreightCorp’s heavy haul coal operations. Other bidders are Rail America, which already owns the Victorian operator Freight Australia; Australian Railroad Group, the consortium of Wesfarmers and Genesee & Wyoming which runs Australia Southern, Australia Western and Australia Northern; and a consortium of Linfox, Thiess, and Graincorp.
The NSW government has agreed to guarantee the jobs of FreightCorp and NRC employees for three years after the sale. The three governments have also agreed to retain the NRC loco maintenance centre at Spotswood in Victoria.
The Commonwealth and NSW governments are reviewing access and track management arrangements for the interstate tracks in NSW, with a view to transferring management responsibility to the Australian Rail Track Corp. This would ’establish seamless interstate rail access arrangements for the first time in Australia’. ARTC is expected to make its proposals in March, with the aim of reaching an agreement by June 2002. n
