The rapporteur Ivan Štefanec (EPP, Slovakia) wants to relax several provisions of the proposed machinery product regulation, including deadlines for implementation and reporting by the European Commission, in a draft text to be presented to the European Parliament’s Committee on Internal Market and Consumer Protection (IMCO) on Thursday 28 October.
Thus, the rapporteur proposes, in his draft report published last Wednesday, to extend the deadline for repealing the Machinery Directive (2006/42/EC), which is to be repealed by this proposed regulation, from 30 to 48 months after the date of entry into force of the new regulation.
This extends the transitional period from 42 to 60 months and the deadline for the Commission to present its first report on the evaluation of the Regulation from 54 to 72 months. Finally, the date of application of the Regulation has been postponed from 30 to 48 months after its entry into force.
The report clarifies the scope of the draft regulation by explicitly excluding motor vehicles. It also provides a number of clarifications to the various definitions proposed by the European Commission, including on machinery and equipment, the life cycle of machinery products and partly completed machinery. In addition, it clarifies the scope of activity of the market surveillance authorities of the Member States, their rights and duties, when a machine does not comply with the Regulation.
The rapporteur will present his text this week. The deadline for tabling amendments is 1 December. Compromise amendments will have to be drafted in February, for a vote in committee in March.
On 21 April 2021, the Commission presented a proposal to revise the Machinery Directive, 15 years after its adoption, to adapt it to digital and emerging technologies. The industry has recently expressed its expectations for the revision of this very technical text (see EUROPE 12804/24).
To access the draft report: https://bit.ly/3B7qipL (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)