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When the new EEC hours regulations come into effect at the end of September, drivers will have greater opportunity to take breaks when it suit them. But the price of flexibility is greater complexity. Reg Dawson explair the new rules
FIRST, the good news. On December 21/ the EEC Council of Ministers repealed regulations 543/69 (on drivers hours) and 1463/70 (on tachographs). Now, the had news. At the same time it adopted two new regulations (3820/85 and 3821/85) which will replace the repealed legislation from September 29 this year. Meanwhile, the present rules remain in 1-oree. The main features of the new rules — longer daily driving times balanced by longer rest periods — were known when the EEC transport ministers adopted them in November (CM, November 23). But until the Eurocrats had turned the ministers' agreement into formal legal texts there were still many uncertainties. (The draftsmen also had to ensure that the new regulations say the same thing in all nine official EEC
languages, which is not always the casi with the repealed legislation.)
The official texts will soon be published in the EEC Official Journal. There are still some doubtful areas, bu it is now possible to see much more clearly how they will affect operators from next autumn onwards. Nevertheless, the rules arc complicated and there arc many minor drafting changes which will affect only a few operators. This article is concerned wit the main thrust of the regulations regarding lorries. It ignores issues such as the 1968 Act rules on spreadover.
Scope
One major simplification is the remov: of a stricter regime for non-rigid vehicles exceeding 20 tonnes gross. In future all vehicles in scope will be subject to the same rules.
Another welcome, if minor, simplification is that the new rules will apply only to those who drive or who are "carried in the vehicle in order to E available for driving if necessary". Drivers mates, where they still exist, will no longer be in scope.
Driving time
The main changes were announced in November and are well known: • Daily limit nine hours, with 10 hours twice a week (an increase of one hour each case); • Continuous driving between breaks 4.5 hours. (At present four hours); • Weekly limit abolished. (At present 41 hours); • Fortnighlly limit 90 hours. (reduced from 92 hours).
Two other changes will have an indirect effect on driving limits: • Interruptions of driving shorter than formal breaks will no longer count as driving time.
• The word "week" will be defined as "U0.00 hours on Monday to 24.00 on Sunday", instead of "any period of' seven consecutive days".
These apparently minor technical changes will have major practical consequences for some drivers. The present regulations say that once
driving period has begun it continues mtil interrupted by a statutory break. >e, a delivery drop lasting 10 minutes :mints as driving. In 1978 the )epartment of Transport tried to get .ound this by reference to the British .ules on spreadover, claiming that ontinuous driving meant just what it aid, and no more. This may have made ense in practice, but was always legally ihoney as some recent court cases have hown. But from September community aw will fall into line with British iractice — a rare event.
This will have little impact on longlistance drivers. But those on local lelivery work will not need to have a veak until they have spent 4.5 hours ictually driving. Those who do less than his in a full day will not need to take a imnai break. But they will still need to [cep a tachograph record, unlike those who operate under the British domestic .ules and drive fbr less than four hours a lay within 40km (25 miles) of base.
Long-distance drivers will benefit ion] the interaction of three new irovisions:
I The new definition of the week.
• The absence of a weekly driving limit.
• The need to take a weekly rest period after six daily driving periods.
At the extreme, a driver who spreads his six driving days over a weekend will be able to have .four 10-hour days — two in each newly defined week — as well as two of nine hours. The total (>1S8 hours is more than 20 per cent higher than the present 48-hour weekly limit.
Even the more typical driver who does not work over the weekend will have a 16.67 per cent increase. He will be able to drive for up to 56 hours — four days at nine hours and two at 10 — in a week.
The 90-hour driving limit "in any one fortnight" means that a 58or 56-hour driving week will have to be followed and preceded by a 32 or 34-hour week respectively. Nevertheless, the new rules offer much greater flexibility, especiallx to international hauliers and their drivers.
Rest periods and breaks
Getting agreement on these was the major political problem in the long amendment process. The outcome is much greater flexibility, but at the price of incredible complexity. With the best will in the world, operators and drivers who take advantage of the new opportunities will find it difficult to keep tabs on the legality of what they are doing. So, I suspect, will enforcement staff.
The rules on breaks, though, are greatly simplified. Drivers of all vehicles will have to take a break of 45 minutes after 4.5 hours' driving unless they begin a daily or weekly rest period. This 45 minutes may be split into breaks of at least 15 minutes each, distributed over the driving period or immediately after it.
The present basic rule on daily rest for single-manned vehicles is virtually unchanged — 11 consecutive hours in each period of 24. But there are minor changes to the rules about the conditions under which this can be reduced:
• It cannot be reduced below nine hours; the present ability to reduce it to eight hours away from base will be abolished.
• The number of times this can be done will go up from two to three a week. • The present rule about compensating "lost" hours will be made more precise — they will have to he made up before the end of the fiillowing week.
Drivers of double-manned vehicles will also benefit from simplification. In future, the same set of rules on daily rest
— eight hours in each period of 30 hours
— will apply whether or not there is a bunk. At present, those without a bunk have to take 10 hours in every 27. But the prohibition on rest being taken in a moving vehicle remains.
The major change concerns the ability to split the daily rest period into two or even three, parts. There will be no limit to the number of times a week this can be done, hut there will be two conditions: • There must be a minimum of eight consecutive hours; • Total daily rest goes up to 12 hours, which must all be taken in that 24-hour period; no part of it may be postponed.
The preamble to the regulation says that this splitting facility is to enable drivers to take their meals and lodgings In different places. But it will also be useful when drivers experience delays or simply want a siesta.
The presen, ability to split daily rest when using a ferry or piggyback train continues unchanged, as an alternative to the new facility.
The changes to weekly rest are less complex, and contain no surprises:
• The normal total will be 45 consecutive hours, including a daily rest period. (An increase of five hours).
• This can be reduced to 36 hours at base, or 24 hours away from base. (At present the reduction to 24 hours can be taken irrespective of location).
• The "lost" hours must be
compensated en bloc before the end of the third week following the week in question. (At present they must be taken during the same week, not necessarily en bloc.) The ability to juggle with certain parts of the daily and weekly periods will certainly make the new rules inure flexible. It will be easier for drivers to take their rest when it suits them, rather than when the regulation says they should. There is also a new provision which enables a driver to choose where he takes his postponed rest hours.
But it is easy to imagine the horrendous calculations that will have to be made in the case of a driver returning from a long international journey, who has made the maximum use of the reductions over a two-week period.
Exemptions and derogations
The exemptions have been rearranged in a way which makes them easier to understand, but there are only a few major changes: • The exemption for tractors with a maximum authorised speed not exceeding 30 km/h will be extended to all vehicles within that limit.
• On the other hand, other tractors and other machines used for agriculture and forestry will no longer be automatically exempt; from 1990 individual governments will have to decide whether to continue to exempt them.
• Milk transport will both gain and lose. A new exemption covers collection from farms and the return to farms of containers or products intended for animal feed. But governments will lose their power to exempt a wider range of milk transport operations.
• Post Office exemption will be narrowed from "vehicles used by postal authorities" to "vehicles used for the carriage of postal articles". This will presumably allow Britain to apply the rules to Post Office parcels operations, thus removing a loud and long-standing Road Haulage Association complaint.
In British politics the most significant addition is probably "vehicles used for the carriage of goods for noncommercial use". When the EEC rules came into force in this country there were cries of horror from the wellconnected horsey fraternity in both Houses of Parliament, who wondered whether they had to fit tachographs if their horseboxes exceeded the 3.5-tonne limit. The old regulations did not say one way or the other; the new ones do. This will also benefit racing pigeon clubs and many other voluntary societies which run lorries. But the new exemption will not apply to similar noncommercial passenger transport.
There are many additions to the list of "derogations" — categories which individual Governments may exempt if they wish. These include many which have been sought by British groups with special interests. The following list is just a sample: • Drivers carrying equipment for their use in the course of work within a 50km radius if driving is not the main activity, This should benefit plumbers, electricians and similar tradesmen.
• Vehicles on islands not exceeding /,300 km2 with no road link to the mainland — in other words, all Scottish islands and the Scillies, but nor the Isle of Wight.
• Vehicles used for driving instruction.
• Vehicles propelled by electricity or gas if treated by national legislation as equivalent to conventional vehicles not exceeding 3.5 tonnes.
• The present derogation for the carriage of animals between farms and local markets will be extended to the local slaughterhouse.
There will also be wider scope for governments to deal with exceptional circumstances. In "urgent cases" goverinnents will he able to suspend the rules without waiting for commission authorisation.
Passenger vehicles
In general, the same rules apply to coach drivers, but there are modifications for those on non-regular international services. They may drive for up to 12 days before taking a weekly rest period. The weekly rest period in such cases may be postponed and added to the second week's rest.
The concession will apply throughout the year, unlike the present dispensation which runs from April to September. And governments may apply it to nonregular internal services if they wish.
Coaches on most regular international services will no longer be exempt from the use of tachographs, though they will have until the end of 1989 to comply with this new requirement. And there is a new power aimed at encouraging governments to rmike tachographs compulsory on reguiar iwernal services as well.
The size of minibus which governments may exempt will go up from 15 to 17 seats, including the driver.
Enforcement
Operators will have two new specific duties laid upon them. They must organise drivers' work so that they can comply with the rules. And they must make periodic checks on compliance.
1968 Act provisions
We shall have to wait and see whether Nicholas Ridley bows to Freight Transport Association pressure to repeal the spreadover and duty hunts of the 1968 Act. But even if he does not, these will have to be drastically amended if they are to mesh with the new EEC rules. Much remains to be decided in the 40 weeks before the new rules come into force. But the centre of activity has switched from Brussels to Marsham Street.