Negotiations resumed on Tuesday 9 February in the Council of the European Union’s Working Party on Land Transport on the revision of the Directive (2006/1) on the use of vehicles hired without drivers for the carriage of goods by road.
The Portuguese Presidency of the EU Council, which hopes to reach a political agreement on the subject by the end of June (see EUROPE 12644/11), has again sent the draft compromise presented in June 2020 by the Croatian Presidency to the national delegations – a draft which was detailed in our columns at the time (see EUROPE 12504/14).
The text in question did not attract support at the time from a sufficient number of Member States. “However, the Presidency wishes to continue the discussion by taking forward the compromise from there”, said Lisbon in a working document, a copy of which has been obtained by EUROPE.
It has therefore invited the delegations to look once more at the text, taking into account “the way in which regulations have evolved since June 2020”. This is a reference to the agreement reached last July over the social and market aspects of the ‘mobility I’ package (see EUROPE 12524/19).
Discussions over the use of vehicles that are rented without a driver have been deadlocked until now, since they were strongly linked to the mobility package regulations on cabotage and market access (1071/2009 and 1072/2009). (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)