Mobility Package: High time for concrete actions to support road transport
Tomorrow the European Commission is expected to adopt a “Mobility Package”, containing important proposals on road charging, access to the road haulage market, enforcement and ways to trigger investment in smart infrastructure.
Remaining barriers to road transport in the single market have a direct and lasting negative impact on the European economy and hamper mobility. BusinessEurope therefore supports concrete actions to tackle market fragmentation. Targeted revisions of existing legislation, for example on access to the road haulage market, should make it simpler and easier to enforce the rules.
BusinessEurope Director General Markus J. Beyrer said: “This package is timely and important to support road transport in Europe. We need to create a level playing field and ensure that truck drivers work under fair circumstances. We must avoid market fragmentation and counter national measures that unduly hamper free movement in the single market.”
The rules laid down in the EU Posting of Workers Directive should not be applied to international road transport operations. It would lead to unworkable situations for companies and add costs and disproportionate administrative burden. The right way forward is to seek separate solutions for the transport sector.
Regarding road charging, a revised European framework must be distance-based and aim to prevent further fragmentation of national systems, and only be for those Member States that decide to put such a system in place.
“It is clear that transport has to become more sustainable. At the same time, care is needed when tackling the environmental challenges in the transport sector without sacrificing efficiency and compromising mobility to the detriment of European competitiveness. ICT and digital solutions have a key role to play to enhance logistics and make transport cleaner”, Beyrer added.
BusinessEurope also continues to call for sufficient investment in core transport infrastructure via existing tools such as the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) and structural funds. Existing finance must be used strategically to trigger private investment to make transport smarter and more sustainable.