Brussels, 16/01/2008 (Agence Europe) - Meeting in plenary session, the European Parliament adopted, on Tuesday 15 January, the report by Paolo Costa (ALDE, Italy) approving the updating of the 1960 regulation on price discrimination and transport conditions presented by the European Commission in the context of the “better regulation” programme.
The report, adopted by an overwhelming majority of votes (669 in favour, 4 against and 7 abstentions), approves the suppression of pointless administrative charges that are currently a burden on transport companies. Thus, freight carriers (rail, road or inland waterways) will no longer have to keep a separate copy of accounting documents at their premises or mention on their transport document information relating to the itinerary, distance or border crossing points. All current forms should be grouped into a single transport document. The revised regulation would nonetheless uphold a former obligation imposed on carriers, namely that of providing information on tariffs, agreements, price agreements and transport conditions in a transport document that must be held in their possession during freight transport.
European Parliament Plenary Session
Carriers will not be allowed to apply different tariffs and conditions for the same goods on the same routes because of the country of origin or destination of the goods.
The change comes about through the Fast Track Actions to lighten the administrative load through minor amendments to existing legislation. According to Commission estimates, simplification of the legislation will affect over 300,000 companies, mainly small and medium-sized enterprises (around 100 rail operators and 7,000 inland waterway operators, the rest being road freight carriers). It will bring savings of €160 million per year. (A.By.)