Antonio Tajani, the President of the European Parliament, decided on Tuesday evening, 26 March, to remove from the agenda the vote scheduled in Parliament plenary session on Wednesday 27 March on the social and market aspects of the first mobility package (posting of drivers, driving time and rest periods, tachograph, cabotage, market access) (see EUROPE 12222/8).
So it will not be again this time. While the MEPs meeting in the European Parliament plenary session were (once again) to decide on these very sensitive road transport issues, Mr Tajani decided otherwise.
At the opening of the session, on Wednesday 27 March, he declared that "1224 amendments" had been tabled, "as well as an almost equally large number of separate votes". He clarified that the ECR group had asked to vote amendment by amendment and not in blocks, as originally planned. Accused of obstruction, Kosma Złotowski (ECR, Poland) did not seek to deny this strategy, stating at a press conference that "obstruction is a normal political method in the parliamentary game".
Thus, in order to avoid "long voting hours", Mr Tajani decided to use Rule 175 of the Parliament's Rules of Procedure. This allows the President of the institution, "When more than 50 amendments or requests for a split or separate vote have been tabled concerning a text tabled by a committee for consideration in Parliament", to refer the files back to the parliamentary committee.
The actors in this dossier in the European Parliament are therefore once again faced with the use of the internal rules of procedure in this area, which have regulated the procedural aspects of the negotiations for months and which no longer seem to have any secrets for them.
It should be noted that Merja Kyllönen (GUE/NGL, Finland) raised the question of the use of Article 175 of the Rules of Procedure, as the issues relating to posting and driving and rest time were not the subject of a text tabled by the Parliament's Transport Committee, since the draft reports on the subject were rejected on 10 January last (see EUROPE 12169/5). Unlike the draft report by Ismail Ertug (S&D, Germany) on cabotage.
The debate on these issues originally scheduled for this Wednesday morning has nevertheless been maintained, which has given Members of the European Parliament the opportunity to exchange views, and in a rather lively way. Both procedural and substantive aspects were discussed, but the discussions showed that the divisions were still as significant within the assembly.
Some pointed to the need to vote on the texts, in particular on the draft compromises tabled at the end of last month by Mr Ertug, Mrs Kyllönen and Mr Telička (ALDE, Czech Republic) (see EUROPE 12204/5). Others argued that the Parliament should not vote, given the differences and the hundreds of amendments on the table ahead of this plenary session, arguing that it would be impossible to find a compromise. On the substance, everyone generally reclaimed their traditional positions.
Isabella de Monte (S&D, Italy) ironically proposed to rename the "mobility package" "immobility package", in view of the length of the discussions.
Next steps. The saga of the first mobility package is therefore not over in the European Parliament and discussions are expected to continue in the coming days. With this referral to the Parliament's Transport Committee, the idea is indeed to convene an extraordinary meeting of this committee next Tuesday, so that Members can vote on the amendments and blocks of amendments.
Article 175 of the Parliament's Rules of Procedure will then apply. The amendments will be voted on, on a model similar to a survey. If an amendment or a separate vote is supported by one third of the committee's MEPs (which should be the case for many of them), it should be put to the vote during the plenary session vote on the dossier in question at the mini plenary session to be held in Brussels on 3 and 4 April.
And if a block were to receive the support of a majority of the members of the parliamentary committee, it could be proposed to Mr Tajani as a 'presidential compromise'. If Mr Tajani accepted it as such, this block could possibly be put to the vote first in the vote in plenary session and would therefore have the possibility of dropping the other compromises, if it were to be approved. In any case, at this plenary session on 3 and 4 April, no new requests for separate votes or amendments could be accepted.
"The Transport Committee will be up to the task", said Mr Tajani, referring to the possibility for the parliamentary committee to bring out blocks of amendments.
Asked by EUROPE about the willingness of Violeta Bulc, the Commissioner for Transport Policy, to conduct and conclude inter-institutional negotiations ('trilogues') before the end of the mandate, in case of a vote on these issues next week in the European Parliament plenary session, Mr Ertug said that he still felt this was “possible”. (Original version in French by Lucas Tripoteau)