Brussels, 11/09/2015 (Agence Europe) - No major measures emerged from the first part of the extraordinary meeting of the land transport safety group, LANDSEC, on Friday 11 September, according to a source at the European Commission.
That morning, the principal European representatives of the railway sector, including the Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER), European Rail Infrastructure Managers (EIM), the International Union of Railways (UIC), Colpofer, and the European Organisation for Security (EOS), exchanged opinions and experiences regarding the question of railway safety, with a view to providing a proportionate response, a European source stressed.
Minor measures already in place were discussed, such as the use of transparent waste bins in railway stations, to ensure the visibility of their content, or training new profilers to analyse passenger behaviour to identify anybody appearing to be acting suspiciously, according to an institutional source. Another point discussed was that in the future, railway companies could be asked to present a safety plan without prescriptive content, in order to leave them considerable margin for manoeuvre, the same source explained. It would be the responsibility of the railway companies to present the safety plans.
“The safety measures would be devised in line with the threat”, it was explained, echoing the standard European Commission line. The source went on to add: “there is no question of making it obligatory to put scanners at the entrances of railway stations […] or to extend PNR to the railway sector [as Belgium called for] or to make any changes to the content of the fourth railway package”. The Commission could make a recommendation in the future, but the decision will be the responsibility of the transport ministers meeting on 8 October of this year, when they will discuss the issue over lunch.
At the time of going to press, the results of the meeting between the member states within LANDSEC, which was held in the afternoon, had not yet been announced and were expected to be made public on Monday 14 September. Furthermore, Coreper I also discussed the rail safety agenda on the same day. “Things will really get moving in the first week of October”, another European source told us. The European Parliament will hold an exchange of views with Transport Commissioner Violeta Bulc, late afternoon on 14 September.
The nine member states which attended the extraordinary ministerial meeting of 29 August (see EUROPE 11375) called upon the Commission to propose operational measures ahead of the forthcoming Transport Council, which will discuss the political pillar of the fourth railway package. The Commission was planning to put forward three measures, but these do not appear to have been actually discussed this morning. (Pascal Hansens)