Gathered in Paris on 30 April 2024, the CEOs of BGL, NLA and FNTR adopted their common manifesto introducing the European priorities of the road freight transport sector for the EU’s next mandate 2024-2029. Since 2019, the three federations gathered their forces to create a Common Office representing the interests of around 25.000 road transport companies.
This document presents seven fundamental policy recommendations and among them, the main challenges of the green transition, digitalisation, and a shrinking labour force. Furthermore, the Common Road Transport Office remains very much involved in defending a fair competition between the road transport operators in the EU, with respect to social aspects and market access rules through the implementation of the Mobility Package.
FNTRs DG, Florence Berthelot said, “For us, it was a success when the Mobility Package was adopted and came then into force, step by step as from August 2020. But we are still concerned about its proper implementation. This, even if we know about the commitment of the European Commission, of the ELA, and of the IRU with ETF through the Trace 2 project, notably. We will continue to defend, with our national authorities, a uniform enforcement approach of the Mobility Package, as we did today in Paris in a very constructive way. It is crucial.”
NLA Chairman and CEO of DTL, Erik Østergaard comments, “We fully support the green transition of the transport sector, but much more is needed to make sure that enabling conditions are in place. There is a heavy demand for adequate and stable power supply of green electricity. And we need to make sure there is sufficient availability of public charging stations, and capacity at the grid to support charging facilities at the customers terminals and road transport companies home charging facilities. Otherwise, the switch to battery electric trucks is not realistic.”
BGL’s CEO Prof. Dr. Dirk Engelhradt: “Next to fighting social dumping and succeeding with the Green Deal, driver shortage will be the predominant challenge for our companies in the coming decade. We need to make the driving job attractive for a more diverse workforce. Well maintained parking areas with proper sanitary facilities, a reform of the EU driver qualification law including more company training and e-learning as well as easier access of third country drivers to the EU labour market are some elements to tackle this problem. Otherwise, the supply of population and the industry by the road freight sector will be in danger.”
