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THE PAIN IN SPAIN

31st August 1995
Page 7
Page 7, 31st August 1995 — THE PAIN IN SPAIN
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

broad is unutterably bloody and foreigners are fiends, said Nancy Mitford. Be onest, there are times when we've all had a sneaking (though politically incorrect) sympathy with her rant about life on the other side of the English Channel. UK operators whose vehicles have been stopped by French and Spanish traffic police on the pretext of not having their tachographs on continental time must have similar thoughts—though probably with a few more Anglo-Saxon epithets. The Department of Transport has apparently obtained official assurances from both French and Spanish authorities that any fines collected for this ludicrous "offence" will be refunded. No doubt the Transport Secretary will shortly be landing at Croydon aerodrome to announce: "I have in my hand a piece of paper...." Let's hope that the Road Haulage Association's piece of paper (see page 8), telling the Spanish Police what the law says, will have a longer lasting impact than Neville Chamberlain's.

he regulation states that a driver must ensure the time recorded agrees with the official time in the country of registration of the vehicle. Unfortunately if a foreign copper wants to make life difficult for you then knowing the law doesn't cut much ice. Presumably this is exactly what European Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock was getting at when he told CM back in April: "Standards of enforcement are uneven." It certainly varies between Brussels and Spain. Kinnock's plans to improve enforcement throughout the union can't come too soon. Especially for British international operators faced with foreign policemen whose aim in life seems to be to fine first and look at the law later.

According to the Commissioner those "improvements" have less to do with pumping more money into the system and more with ensuring there's the political will to make the laws stick. At the risk of being pedantic Commissioner, it's also about making sure that everybody in the EU knows what the law says in the first place. Surely the French and Spanish know that?


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