Quota stalemate
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FOR THE SECOND year running there will be no increase in the EEC permit quota in 1984 and Britain's allocation will remain at 436, about 10 per cent of the total, our Brussels and news staff report. the cars they export to Britain." The champagne corks popped in Brussels on Tuesday last week when EEC transport ministers held their pre-Christmas meeting to mark the 900th session of the Council of Ministers since the Common Market was founded.
But there was precious little else to celebrate at a meeting which ended in deadlock after seven hours and failed to take a single decision of substance.
The Ministers came close, however, to an agreement on the vexed question of lorry weights and sizes which would have been acceptable to Britain.
The formula under discussion was for the EEC to settle on 40 tonnes and an 11-ton axle weight, while Britain and Ireland would have been granted a transitional period of indefinite duration.
"We would not have been tied by this directive," said Transport Secretary Nicholas Ridley after the meeting.
But the Italians raised objections which blocked an agreement — and also prevented any increase in the quota because the West Germans would not budge on this issue without progress on lorry weights.
Said Mr Ridley: "The whole idea of a quota is something which belongs to the Middle Ages. We don't give the Germans, for example, a quota for There was also deadlock on another issue of interest to the road haulage industry EEC financial aid for certain transport infrastructure schemes.
Agreement to spend 15m European Currency Units (ecu) from the EEC's 1983 budget and 50m ecu next year was blocked partly as a result of a British stand designed to ensure that funds provided for the M25 orbital route around London.
"The Community has had a bad day," sighed Mr Ridley before catching his plane home.
The British Government's atti tude is that it cannot persuade Parliament to accept an increase in lorry weights until the infrastructure fund can be established to provide funds for roads which would keep lorries out of villages.
Nor is it keen to say openly how far it believes it can develop the package of weights agreed for this year's increase in articulated vehicles' weight to 38 tonnes. A 38-tonne drawbar weight (CM, December 17) is something DTp officials seem to favour and which Mr Ridley would probably support privately, but for the Government to say it would back this now would only invite its rejection by MPs.