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EC litho regs slide back into chaos
Page 6
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Digital tacho regulations are delayed until November. As the industry
reels at the news, operators fume. Andy Salter reports.
OPERATORS HAVE criticised EU bureaucrats for continued delays and confusion surrounding the digital tachograph legislation which was due to take effect from August.
Speaking at the FTA Freight Summit this week,John Berry, EC principal administrator of transport and energy, says procedural delays in the European Parliament will delay the launch of digital tachographs until N ovember.The European Parliament is due to complete its second reading of the legislation in June, but it won't be approved until the autumn.
This might come as a relief to UK operators faced with a raft of new regulations. but the confusion that now surrounds the launch is of no help to those operators who were gearing up for an August deadline.
Independent consultant John Walter, formerly of the Lane Group, summed up the mood of many operators at the FTA Summit:"We can't plan when we don't even know when the legislation is going to come.
"How many drivers, if trained now, will remember in December what they have learned?
"I have less faith in the EC than I had before — the whole business of digital tachographs has been pathetic."
In addition to the operational problems the delay has thrown the plans of the DVLA and the truck and equipment manufacturers into disarray. The DVLA plans to begin issuing driver and company smart cards in May, while both Volvo and Renault have said they will begin fitting the new tachographs in their trucks from June. However, without the legislation being ratified by the European Parliament neither target appears feasible.