A proposed German motorway toll, which integrates a measure to reimburse the owners of German registered cars, continues to raise questions among Germany's neighbours, including Luxembourg, concerning its compliance with European law, in particular the principle of non-discrimination.
The European Commission has just closed an infringement procedure against Germany in relation to the measure.
In this context, Minister François Bausch yesterday convened a joint-ministerial meeting bringing together his peers from Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic to share their concerns with their German counterpart.
This meeting took place on the eve of the Transport Council in the Ministry of Sustainable Development and Infrastructure, where ministers reported on their respective positions and held an exchange of views on the toll, as well as a new Road Package initiative by the European Commission.
On 31 May this year, the Commission presented the Road Package which proposes, among other things, harmonisation at European level of the kilometric tax for heavy goods vehicles for which the existing vignettes will have to be replaced by a kilometric tax from 2023 onwards. Other vehicles, including passenger cars for which vignettes already exist, will then be subject to the user-pays regime from 2027.
This Commission initiative allows Member States to introduce a kilometric tax for passenger cars on a voluntary basis, however, if Member States choose to do so, they must comply with European standards. This implies that once the new European standards are in force, the existing vignette systems will also have to comply with the measures proposed by Brussels.
Minister François Bausch welcomes this Commission initiative which will result in a long-term harmonised system of road taxation within the European Union, putting an end to the current and discussed discrepancies of views of today's date, An appeal to the Court of Justice of the European Union thus becomes superfluous.
Nevertheless, Minister Bausch decided with his Dutch and Austrian counterparts to ask the Commission to furnish a legal justification for why the proceedings initiated by the latter against the German toll were closed.
