02/03/2004 (Agence Europe) - The German government has given Toll Collect a second chance for introducing an electronic toll system for heavy goods vehicles on the German motorways. The Transport Minister, Manfred Stolpe, announced in mid-February, the termination of the contract with the DaimlerChrysler, Deutsche Telekom consortium and the French Cofiroute company because the sophisticated satellite surveillance system put into place well behind schedule two months ago did not work. Toll Collect had until now refused to pay damages and interest suffered by the German state due to the malfunction but finally agreed to new conditions and a selection of significant fines for not respecting contractual obligations. Therefore, the introduction of first generation cable boxes is palnned for 1 January 2005 at the latest and second generation boxes will be introudced on 1 January 2006 at the latest. Mr Stolpe had been taken to task by opposition MEPs for his management of this unfortunate affair (EUROPE 19 February p 17).