More than 2,000 UK road haulage companies entered insolvency between 2021 and 2025, almost double the total recorded in the previous five-year period, according to parliamentary data. The figures show 2,051 insolvencies in 2021–2025, up from 1,068 in 2016–2020 in the SIC 49410 category, freight transport by road.
Put another way, the UK lost road haulage firms at an average of almost eight insolvencies a week over those five years.
Here is the annual breakdown provided by the Secretary of State for Business and Trade on 3 February 2026:
| Calendar Year | 49410 – Freight transport by road |
| 2016 | 146 |
| 2017 [note 1] | 195 |
| 2018 [note 1] | 247 |
| 2019 | 285 |
| 2020 | 195 |
| 2021 | 265 |
| 2022 | 411 |
| 2023 | 503 |
| 2024 | 471 |
| 2025 | 401 |
Note 1: Numbers exclude bulk insolvencies that occurred between April 2016 and early 2019, following changes to the IR35 rules and to the VAT flat rate. If included, the numbers for 2017 would be 326, and for 2018, 256.
A much weaker picture after 2020
The shift after 2020 is hard to miss. Insolvencies did not simply edge up: they moved to a clearly higher range from 2021 onwards and then stayed there for four straight years. Even though 2025 was below the 2023 peak, it still remained far above pre-2021 levels.
That does not prove that every collapse was caused by Brexit alone. The parliamentary answer records the number of insolvent businesses in the sector, not the reason behind each failure. But it does show that the post-Brexit trading period has been much harsher for UK road haulage than the five years before it.
There is also an important technical caveat in the official data. The 2017 and 2018 figures exclude bulk insolvencies linked to IR35 and VAT flat-rate changes; if those were included, the 2017 number would be 326 instead of 195, and the 2018 figure would be 256 instead of 247. Even with that adjustment, however, the 2021–2025 total still stands far above the 2016–2020 period.
Thin margins, rising costs, lots of very small operators
The insolvency figures become more understandable when set against the sector’s broader economics. In its 2024 cost report, the Road Haulage Association said it had been “another torrid year for operators” and noted that nearly 500 logistics-related firms had collapsed in 2023. The report also said average operating costs rose by 3.51% including fuel and 5.95% excluding fuel.
The UK road freight market is a highly fragmented market dominated by very small businesses. Department for Transport analysis shows that 92% of road freight businesses had 0–9 employees in 2023, indicating a large share of the sector comprises micro-operators and small firms with limited room to absorb prolonged cost pressure, weaker rates, or disrupted cash flow.
Read more: Major insolvencies at a record high: Europe under pressure, logistics particularly exposed
The broader business demography also points in the same direction. The Office for National Statistics says the number of transport and storage businesses fell 9.1% in 2024, with freight transport by road down 15.5%. The same release notes a 14% fall in single-employee limited companies in freight transport by road compared with 2023.
That helps explain why the insolvency trend feels bigger than a dry company-law statistic. In a sector where so many operators are tiny, the loss of several hundred firms a year points to a market that has become less resilient, with less slack for owner-drivers and small hauliers already working on narrow margins.
The figures were disclosed in response to a written parliamentary question asking for the number of business insolvencies in the UK road haulage sector over the past ten years.
