EU tacho deadlock broken by choice
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by David Harris • The European deadlock on introducing new-generation tachographs is set to be broken by giving hauliers a choice on which system to install.
Until now EU members have been at loggerheads over whether tachos should be uprated with bolt-on additions or replaced by a digital smart card system.
The European Commission is playing down the change, but the compromise has been broadly welcomed in the industry.
The Freight Transport Association has fiercely opposed the bolt-on option as a compromise which it estimates would cost British industry £100m: "Our problem with it is partly cost—because it will have to be replaced in time with a digital system in any case—but also that a digital system is likely to provide on-board diagnostics about how the vehicle is running," says the FTA. "This will be a great help to transport managers."
Lucas Kienzle, Britain's biggest tachograph manufacturer, is not so sure about the benefits of abandoning the chart.
Richard Edmonds, technical and service man. ager, says: "An either/or option was probably inevitable, but there may be problems with a new digital system. With a chart tachograph the speed and distance trace can be forensically analysed and it is unlikely a smart card could do this as fully. Security could also be a problem."
• Although the European Commission has now tabled proposals which could let hauliers choose which new-generation tachograph they use, it is likely to be more than a year before a firm decision is taken.
The Council of Ministers has to approve the measures and neither the Spanish, who now hold the Presidency, nor the Italians or the Irish, who hold the next two six-month Presidencies, are interested in discussing it. Instead the tachograph issue will probably come up during the Dutch Presidency, in the First six months of 1997.