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FOR E.E.C.
Page 65
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READ U.S.A.
The Institute of Transport were told on Monday that a study of the evolution of the federal system of regulating transport in the United States would throw light on what would happen in the search for a common transport policy in the Common Market
ASTUDY of the federal system of regulating transport in the United States would throw a lot of light on what is going to happen in the search for a common transport policy within the Common Market. This was said to the Institute of Transport in London on Monday by Brig. A. E. M. Walter, chairman of the Transport Policy Committee of the European Conference of Ministers of Transport. He also pointed out that there were flaws in the Treaty of Rome— the document which founded the Common Market.
Brig. Walter said that, because there were no customs tariffs between member countries, more cases would arise where the cost of transport became critical in determining price of products. The need to invest in more efficient transport facilities would therefore increase.
The Treaty laid down three stages, each of four years, during which cust6ms tariffs between members should be reduced to zero • and lays down that certain things have to lie done by the end of each of these stages—stage two has already started. During certain stages of the interim period everyone had an equal vote and everyone had the power of veto, but at other stages everyone had to abide by the majority decision.
The Common Market worked through many bodies. There was, first, an Assembly which had to be consulted on the implementation of two of the most important articles on transport in the Rome Treaty. Secondly, there was a Council; most of the important transport iecisions rested with this Council. Thirdly, there was a commission. which was the executive body of the Community, and -lad some powers of decision in the field of transport. Fourthly, there was a Court of Justice; fifthly, an economic and social :ornmittee which had a transport section and had to be consulted on certain occasions. There was also an expert transport consultative committee.
Transport policy problems really came :o the fore after the war, when the U.N. Economic Commission for Europe set ap its Inland Transport Committee in l947, dedicated to seeking a common ransport policy. The aims were still the ;ame 10 years later, when the Rome Treaty was signed, and they are still the ;ame now. There was no real agreement Ml the principles or the conditions of a ong-term common transport policy.
Nevertheless, these long years of disaassion in the international bodies tchieved two things: the real issues were nade clearer and the positions, opinions md attitudes of different countries had become much clearer. A cleavage of opinion on three basic questions (the role of transport in the national economy, access to the transport market, and price control) existed among the six member countries at the time the Treaty of Rome was being drafted and was reflected in the fact that the Treaty said little precisely and left so much for decision during the 12-year • transition period—of which nearly five years have already gone by.
In addition to leaving transport policy itself to the future, the extent to which many of the general principles and rules to be found in the Treaty are applicable to transport was not even made clear. This was a very important omission because, if it was decided in the future that the general rules of the Treaty do not apply in the sphere of transport, the common policy would be different from one which would be dependent on the general rules. It raised the vital question of the extent to which transport would go it alone.
A number of loopholes have been provided in the Treaty to soften the shocks which could arise due to the application of common rules to transport policy. Article 80 of the Treaty, for instance, prohibited subsidy by rates and conditions of carriage for any traffic moving only by one form of transport; but if it were moved by more than one, it is considered that the competition between those forms of transport would keep the rates at a suitable level.
One of the most important articles on transport was Article 77 because, although nothing was said in the Treaty of Rome 'as to whether transport should be regarded as a public service or a commercial undertaking, this article said clearly that if a carrier performed a public service then his government could give him aids in compensation. It also permitted subsidies if they were made in the name of co-ordination. This could mean almost anything.
Article 78 was another which reflected the general uncertainty of thinking when the Treaty was being drafted. This says that the carrier's economic situation should be taken into account when taking decisions on rates and conditions of carriage. It thus limited the scope for action on price control and created a nice maintenance of the "status quo" feeling.
The differences of opinion which lead to the drafting of an imprecise Treaty, coupled with the fact that the most important decisions required unanimous approval until the end of the second stage. had hindered rapid progress in implementing the Treaty during the first stage. Two obvious first objectives would be the prohibition of discriminatory rates and equalization of rules relating to international transport. The core of the whole problem of common policy was a decision whether a common market in goods required a common market in transport services—the Six could riot agree among themselves on this. In measuring the amount of progress towards a common transport policy one could not overstress the differences of opinion on the subject and so the difficulties' in getting tangible results. The pace was undoubtedly "hotting up ".
The action programme issued this year was another definite step forward, although the ultimate decisions of the common transport policy rested with the Council. The size of the market for international road goods transport and access • to it would be controlled by the Commission after 1971 while the sizes of the national markets and access to them would remain in the hands of the member states and be operated under as similar rules as possible. All this generally followed the system in the United States, where access to the inter-state market was controlled by the Inter-state Commerce Commission and the intra-state market was'regulated by ea.ch state.
Very few people indeed really understood all the issues and ,complexities. Inevitably, as in the USA, a new species of man (probably also to be known as a transport consultant) would . gradually breed in Brussels. Could we expect anything other than compromise in the final decisions on transport policy, particularly with regard to the three main issues and would it be adult to express surprise if things turned out this way? The middle position seemed, to him, to be that transport should be regarded as a commercial undertaking and compensation should be given for public services which the carriers were compelled to provide.
He would like to suggest, said Brig, Walter, that a study of the evolution of the federal system of regulating transport in the U.S.A. would throw a lot of light on what is going to happen in the search for a common transport policy in the Common Market, although we must not forget one big difference. In the U.S.A. a federal congress had given powers to a federal inter-state commerce commission to regulate transport; in the Common Market the power lay with a Council of Ministers and the Commission in Brussels had no powers at all comparable to those granted to the Inter-state Commission.