1st Fleet, an Australian trucking company that operates in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, locked out about 1,000 workers and ceased trading overnight without any warning on Wednesday night.

The move was made despite the appointment last week of administrators to place the firm into liquidation. Workers are now clueless as to the future of their employment.

The firm explained on its Web site that its funding was not extended due to the director's failure to meet pre-arranged commitments. The administrators said it is liaising with the Transport Workers Union to help the affected employees find other jobs.

1st Fleet ceased trading at 11:55 p.m. Administrator Riad Tayeh said the transport firm run out of cash.

"As you can see it's a tough time in the economy, so we're just trying to get a handle on the cash flow at the moment and trade it on and see what we can do with it," Mr Tayeh was quoted by 9 News.

Prior to the cease trading, contract drivers were not paid for their services for two months, TWU National Secretary Tony Sheldon disclosed.

When the employees gathered outside company premises in Sunshine, west Melbourne and in Sydney, they were given termination forms. 1st Fleet owns about 1,000 trucks and employs about 1,000 people.

Outside the lucrative resource sector, jobs in other Australian sectors are being axed by the hundreds in the past few weeks including those in the banking, manufacturing and retail sectors. It is a manifestation of the three-speed economy in Australia.

Some of the tasks, like those in banks, are not removed but outsourced to Asian countries where labour cost is significantly lower compared to standard wages of Australian workers.

However, for the mining sector, large mining firms are pushing for the lifting of work visa quotas to fill in the shortage of manpower.

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