Skip to main content

EU member states call for action on low paid truck drivers

Transport ministers from eight EU countries and Norway met in Paris have called for the introduction of fairer social rules to govern road transport before the sector is opened up to greater liberalisation, according to EurActiv France. France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Austria, Luxembourg, Belgium, Sweden and Norway met this week to adopt a joint declaration calling for the creation of a common market for transport, in order to safeguard workers’ rights, in particular Eastern Europe drivers who deliver g
February 3, 2017 Read time: 2 mins
Transport ministers from eight EU countries and Norway met in Paris have called for the introduction of fairer social rules to govern road transport before the sector is opened up to greater liberalisation, according to EurActiv France.

France, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Austria, Luxembourg, Belgium, Sweden and Norway met this week to adopt a joint declaration calling for the creation of a common market for transport, in order to safeguard workers’ rights, in particular Eastern Europe drivers who deliver goods seemingly non-stop to all four corners of the continent and with terrible working conditions .

“Professional drivers have become road slaves,” Alain Vidalies, the French transport minister, told the press after Tuesday’s meeting.

“These countries came together in Paris today and decided to act together to end unfair competition and the degradation of the living standards of professional drivers in the road transport sector,” he added.

The question of unfair competition and social dumping in the goods transport sector is an incendiary issue between the EU’s eastern member states, which are the biggest suppliers of low-cost drivers, and their western partners. Unfair competition from the East is gradually forcing western European transport companies out of business.

Related Content

  • June 20, 2016
    Association News on ITS
    Association news from around the globe; Austria, Norway, Czech Republic & Slovakia associations share plans for C-ITS. ITS UK thinks countries boasting that legal autonomous vehicles will become a regular feature on their roads are straying far from the case. ITS Australia debates driverless vehicles and Eu ecall helped on its way.
  • August 21, 2017
    Cost benefit goes under the microscope
    Conventional cost benefit analysis (CBA) of plans for urban smart mobility initiatives needs serious rethinking, according to a recently-completed European study. The three-year Evidence Project (the Project) emerged in response to concerns about the availability and quality of documented research – including CBA – required to prove that investment in sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs) can be economically beneficial. Covering 22 sectors ranging from electric vehicles to shared spaces, the Project clai
  • June 2, 2017
    Ministers call for improved governance for transport
    Transport Ministers from the 57 member countries of the International Transport Forum have expressed their political will to improve the governance frameworks for transport in order to help achieve objectives agreed by the international community.
  • June 10, 2015
    Call for Juncker to reverse decision to drop serious road injury target
    More than 40 European organisations concerned with road safety, together with 11 members of the European Parliament have sent a letter to President Jean-Claude Juncker urging him to not drop setting new EU target to cut serious road injuries. The letter was sent yesterday by the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC), ahead of Thursday's meeting of national transport ministers in Luxembourg where the target was set to be announced. The European Transport Safety Council has learnt that the announcemen