Sweetening the tacho pill
Page 5
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Britain presses for mileage limit 'swop' in Brussels
THE EEC Council of Ministers has been asked to approve a proposal that the contentious 450km (281-mile) daily driving limit for drivers of heavy artics and drawbar outfits should not apply to vehicles equipped with an EEC tachograph.
This is seen as a way of throwing out the generally disliked 450km limit, while placating the few members — notably West Germany — who are reluctant to see all checks on distance removed.
For the Six, who are well advanced with fitting and using tachographs, the deal would bring immediate benefits. For Britain, it would provide a strong argument to overcome trade union and operator resistance to tachograph use.
Knowing that virtually all nine member countries were in favour of the proposal, the British contingent at the Council meeting in Brussels this week were intent on pressing strongly for its adoption as a resolution of Ministers. It would then have to be drafted by the Commission as a regu, lation (since only the Commission can initiate legislation) and go through the formal stages before becoming law; but in this instance it could be expected to become law quite quickly, since it is thought to have almost universal support.
Britain was also planning to press this week for the 450km daily limit to be removed completely from national (ie domestic) transport operations, regardless of any EEC tachograph deal. One of the factors in the British initiative was the concern of trailer manufacturers —expressed through t he Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders—that the 450km limit on drivers of big artics and drawbar outfits would stimulate a switch to rigid vehicles.
The .Department of the Environment has written to the SMMT expressing its belief that member States will agree to the deletion of the 450km limit on vehicles having EEC tachos. It is implicit in this that the tachographs will have to be used, and not just fitted.
The revised legislation would specify that Article 6 of Regulation 543/69 would not apply, from a certain date, to vehicles in which an EECtype tachograph was used for the purpose of monitoring the activity of the driver. Article 6 specifies that a driver of a vehicle with more than one trailer or semi-trailer; or a single-trailer combination used to carry passengers and having a permissible trailer gross weight of over 5 tonnes; or a goods-carrying combination having one semi-trailer or trailer, with a permissible gross combination weight exceeding 20 tonnes, shall not drive for more than 450km between daily rest periods.