Kotug and SNRH give up the unequal struggle in Le Havre
Societe Nouvelle de Remorquage du Havre (SNRH), a subsidiary of Netherlands based Kotug, has given up it’s long battle to operate a tug service in the French container port of Le Havre in competition with the fleet operated by Boluda.
On New Years Eve Kotug finally withdrew financial support for SNRH, causing its subsidiary to close down.
It was reported that 73 staff were dismissed and the five tug fleet left the port. The two ‘Rotor’ tugs RT Stephanie and RT Clare were returned to the parent company in Rotterdam and the ASD tugs SD Gironde, SD Loire and SD Seine sailed for the UK port of Falmouth crewed by staff from delivery specialist Redwise. All five tugs are registered under the Maltese flag and owned by an associate holding company.
Kotug’s attempt to operate in the French port has been fraught with difficulties from the very beginning. After a lengthy legal battle with the French authorities, the tugmen’s union and the existing tug operator Les Abeille (latterly Groupe Boluda), the company first began operation in 2006. Since that date the service has been brought to a halt on numerous occasion by disputes centred around manning levels and statutory rest periods.
At the heart of the SNRH operational strategy was the need to operate the tugs with crews of three persons, as Kotug does in other European ports. A further blow came in July 2010 when the French authorities decided that the manning regime contravened regulation governing crew rest periods.
The collapse of SNRH leaves the French arm of Spanish owned Boluda with a total monopoly in the port of Le Havre.
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