France faces tough line on rail freeway

Date: 24/07/1997

By Tim Jones

THE French authorities are under pressure to open their brand new rail freeway to all-comers to allay the European Commission's competition concerns.

To the surprise of many of his colleagues, French Transport Minister Jean-Claude Gayssot announced late last month that he was sponsoring a freight railway between Muizen in Belgium, Bettembourg in Luxembourg and Sibelin/Venissieux in France.

But he also made it plain that the new freeway would only be open to established combined transport operators, in accordance with existing EU rules.

Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock is pressing for member states to go beyond the current rules and offer open access to specific freight routes.

The new freight network will provide seven new routes per day for customers, a reduction in travel time of up to 25&percent; and extra annual capacity of 2 million tonnes. Like the other freeways, the system will have a single contact point for coordinating route requests and setting prices.

But the proposal to limit access to the route could spark a clash with the Commission.

Competition Commissioner Karel van Miert has already made it clear that the establishment of these 'one-stop shops' between infrastructure managers - the companies which own and operate the tracks, signalling and fixed equipment - could be anti-competitive.

After internal discussions between the staff of Kinnock and Van Miert, it was agreed that a freeway would have to be opened to any operator with non-discriminatory charging of user-fees.

This is precisely why the authorities in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Italy and Switzerland are planning a prototype freeway between the northern ports and Milan, Venice and Genoa.

That Gayssot, the new French minister, a Communist who worked on the railways before entering politics, is planning to back such a venture at all has come as a surprise.

He had been expected to take a tough line against Kinnock and his idea of a free-market rail network in Europe, given that his former labour union, the Fédération des Cheminots of the CGT, is adamantly opposed to a system which would allow private rail operators on to the nationalised tracks.

“We are completely against open access and will not accept other private operators on the network,” said Patrick Chamaret, a CGT national secretary. “We have to ensure that quality, security and social conditions are maintained on our railways.”

The three rail operators will file their application for clearance for the freight corridor this year under Article 85 of the Treaty of Rome, which bans concerted action between companies which restricts competition.

In his plan for rail freeways, Kinnock stressed that the simplest way to win approval for combined infrastructure activities was to provide open access to tracks for all registered operators and establish full independence between track management and operating divisions in integrated railway companies.

“It may still be alright without open access, but it certainly makes it more difficult,” admitted one Commission official.