Brussels, 26/01/2011 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday 25 January, the European Parliament's transport committee confirmed their desire to continue talks with the Council of Ministers to seek agreement in second reading on the revised Eurovignette directive to include external costs generated by road transport in the charges for using road infrastructure (see EUROPE 10254). The Council's common position (see EUROPE 10237) will be officially submitted to the EP early next month. The first three-way meeting this year will be held in the first fortnight in February, explained EP rapporteur Saïd El Khadraoui (S&D, Belgium), speaking at the transport committee on Tuesday. During the discussion that followed the rapporteur's speech, the MEPs seemed optimistic about the outcome of the talks although their views on various issues have not yet been clarified, such as the scope of the directive (the Council wants the present exemption for lorries of between 3.5 tonnes and 12 tonnes to continue), the use of income generated by charging for external costs (the Council wants to leave this to the member states to decide, but the rapporteur wants the member states to make public what they will be doing with the toll-road cash), variations in the infrastructure toll to cover congestion (175% for a maximum of five hours according to the Council, but the MEPs say this is too high) and exemptions for less-polluting lorries (EURO VI and EURO V). The EPP says the Council's ideas are “in the right direction”, said Corien Wortmann-Kool of the Netherlands. On behalf of the EPP, she said that the congestion surcharge needed to be decided upon, but agreed with El Khadraoui on making public what the income generated will be used for. Dirk Sterckx (ALDE, Belgium) stressed the income's neutrality. The Greens/EFA and the Conservatives (ECR) queried the exemptions for lorries of between 3.5 an 12 tonnes. (A.By./transl.fl)