11 March Transport Council

Date: 13/03/1997

TRANSPORT ministers failed to come to a final decision on the Commission's proposals for a revised Eurovignette charging system for heavy goods vehicles. Discussions concentrated on the maximum allowable charge, whether to include differential pricing according to trucks' environmental characteristics, the possibility of lower charges for peripheral countries and the desirability of levying additional charges on Alpine routes, notably the Brenner pass. Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock and Dutch Transport Minister Annemarie Jorritsma acknowledged the link between these talks and the ongoing negotiations on closer road transport relations between the EU and Switzerland. No significant progress appears to have been made on the Swiss dossier, although Kinnock said member states had broadly backed the Commission's negotiating stance.

FRANCE lost its campaign to abandon the summer-time regime, when ministers rejected its arguments for ditching European rules synchronising the biannual change. The decision, which must be cleared by the European Parliament before final adoption, means that for the four years from 1998, all EU countries will move their clocks forwards and backwards together in March and October. French Minister Anne-Marie Idrac said France would remain in line with its partners in 1997 and 1998. After that, “we will see”, she added. France did secure the promise of another study on summer time to be completed by the Commission by the end of June 1999.

MINISTERS reached political agreement to extend an existing list of older, noisier aircraft allowed to use EU airports until 1 April 2002. The agreement names specific aircraft from 16 countries which may serve the Union until the phase-out date. These are Algeria, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Swaziland, Tunisia, Uganda, Zaïre and Zimbabwe. The rules will also allow Berlin's Tegel and Tempelhof airports to bar so-called Chapter II aircraft immediately after the rules come into force.

AGREEMENT was reached on the terms of reference for future work on EU involvement with the European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation (Eurocontrol) and the setting up of a European civil aviation safety body.

MINISTERS held a discussion on taxing aviation fuels and approved a draft resolution prepared by the Dutch presidency to be sent to finance ministers for further consideration. The Commission will be asked to feed additional data into the debate.

THE meeting agreed a resolution on the development of road transport telematics, championed by the Netherlands, which wanted a political signal from its partners that efforts would be made to find common technical standards for electronic fee collection systems.

THERE was an orientation debate on proposed amendments to the rules on tachographs used to measure the movements of lorries in the Union, to bring the regulations up to date with the latest technology. New specifications should be agreed by July 1998. A political accord should be possible at the June meeting of transport ministers.

POLITICAL agreement was reached on the new PACT programme (Pilot Actions for Combined Transport). This will update the previous programme, which ran until the end of last year. The new scheme will cover the 1997-2001 period, raising the budget from 18 million to 35 million ecu. Parliament must now give its opinion on the plan before it can be formalised.

JORRITSMA informed her colleagues about the conclusions of the recent meeting of EU environment ministers on climate change. Ministers asked the Commission to prepare a report on measures to be taken to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, from ground, air and maritime transport sources.

KINNOCK presented reports on a number of subjects. These included information on the Fourth and Fifth Research and Development Framework Programmes; progress by the high-level groups on public-private partnerships and freight freeways; and the Commission's proposal on airline ramp checks.