In a joint letter addressed to the highest representatives of the European Union, copied to EUROPE, the Prime Ministers of six Member States (Bulgaria, Romania, Latvia, Poland, Hungary and Lithuania) called on the EU Council, the European Parliament and the European Commission on Thursday 24 October to "carefully reassess" the proposals related to the ‘mobility 1’ package.
For these countries, while the dossiers relating to the social and market aspects of the ‘mobility I’ package have entered the final phase of the legislative process - they are currently the subject of interinstitutional negotiations ('trilogue') (see EUROPE 12341/9) - the substance of the package compared to the Commission's initial proposal has been 'critically' changed during the legislative process.
Their criticisms relate in particular to three proposed provisions.
The first is the obligation for trucks used in international transport to regularly return to the Member State of establishment of the company employing the drivers.
While the agreement reached in the EU Council in December 2018 (see EUROPE 12152/10) does not provide for such a return, the position adopted by the Parliament in April 2019 (see EUROPE 12229/1) considers, on the other hand, that these trucks must be loaded or unloaded at least once every 4 weeks in the company's State of establishment.
The second is the restriction of cabotage operations.
Finally, their last criticism concerns the classification of transport operations according to whether or not they are covered by posting of workers provisions.
Stressing that road transport is "the backbone as well as a significant driver of European trade and economic growth", the six signatories also consider that the new provisions proposed during the legislative process were "put forward under severe time pressure and were not supported by proper and extensive impact assessments".
Therefore, they request that impact assessments be carried out for all key proposed legislative amendments before moving the negotiations forward.
According to a source close to the issue, even if the positions expressed, after long and difficult negotiations, by the EU Council and Parliament are not so far apart, the next trilogues are still likely to be difficult, due to the internal tensions that exist in each of the institutions, particularly between the Member States.
See the letter: http://bit.ly/368cywo (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)