European Commission refers Cyprus, the Netherlands and Portugal to Court for failing to upgrade road transport registers

Source: European Commission (EC) i, published on Thursday, May 14 2020.

The Commission has decided to refer Cyprus, the Netherlands and Portugal to the Court of Justice of the EU as they did not upgrade their registers of road transport companies. All Member States should have upgraded the connection between their registers and the revised European Registers of Road Transport Undertakings (ERRU), by 30 January 2019, as required by the Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/480.

The ERRU allows information exchange between Member States on road transport companies established in the EU. It is an essential instrument to ensure enforcement of EU legislation and fair competition among operators in the road transport sector.

Since Cyprus, the Netherlands and Portugal have not upgraded their connections within the legal deadline, the Commission has decided to refer the cases to the Court of Justice of the EU.

The Commission opened an EU infringement procedure against the three countries by sending a letter of formal notice to the national authorities in July 2019, followed by a reasoned opinion in November 2019.

Background

The European Commission adopted rules for linking national electronic registers of road transport undertakings via the ERRU system (European Registers of Road Transport Undertakings), which has been operational since 1 January 2013. The implementation of a new and enhanced version of ERRU requires Member States to adapt their systems at national level.

The upgrade should begin with preliminary tests provided for in Article 3 paragraph 2 of the Regulation, as amended by the Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2017/1440. The Member States listed have not performed the preliminary tests and therefore their national systems have not been upgraded to the new ERRU version.

For more information

On the key decisions in the May 2020 infringements package, see INF/20/859

On the general infringements procedure, see MEMO/12/12