Experts from the Council of the European Union's Land Transport Working Party worked on Tuesday 17 September on the first draft compromise of the Finnish Presidency of the Council of the European Union on the revision of Directive 1999/EC on road infrastructure user charges (see EUROPE 12326/13), with discussions expected to continue in the coming weeks.
While this text introduces more flexibility than proposed by the former Romanian Presidency of the institution (see EUROPE 12272/5), some national delegations would have welcomed this new draft compromise. On the other hand, not surprisingly, other Member States would have continued to express reservations.
The challenge for the Finnish Presidency of the EU Council is to find a balance between the flexibilities that could benefit the Member States, which would be conducive to a possible political agreement (‘general approach’), and the obligations on national authorities, which are more in line with the European Commission's proposal (see EUROPE 11799/6), but which would be received with some scepticism by several delegations.
The current EU Council Presidency is aiming for a general approach by the end of 2019, as Sanna Marin, the Finnish Minister of Transport, told MEPs of the European Parliament's Transport Committee on 24 July (see EUROPE 12303/6). Exchanges between national experts in working groups are expected to continue in the coming weeks.
On the European Parliament's side, MEPs adopted their position at first reading on this text in October 2018 (see EUROPE 12125/2). (Original version in French by Lucas Tripoteau)