Goods Vehicles (International Road Transport Permits and Haulage Within the EU) Regulations 2024

Considered in Grand Committee

Moved by

That the Grand Committee do consider the Goods Vehicles (International Road Transport Permits and Haulage Within the EU) Regulations 2024.

My Lords, I beg to move that these regulations be considered. They have two main purposes. First, they implement fully some specialised provisions contained in the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, which I will refer to, if I may, as the TCA, in relation to UK-based operators and drivers. These provisions are connected to declarations for most lorry drivers working for UK-based operators when they make journeys between two points in the European Union.

The TCA provisions had a go-live date in 2022. They have been implemented administratively in the UK already, through the glossing provision in the European Union (Future Relationship) Act 2020. These regulations add enforcement powers and increase legal certainty. The full implementation of these provisions is needed to ensure continued, reciprocal access for the movement of goods vehicles between the UK and EU.

Secondly, this instrument amends legislation governing the allocation of permits for the purposes of the transport of goods outside the United Kingdom. The UK has made several new or amended bilateral road transport agreements with countries outside the EU since the previous legislation in 2018. The 2018 regulations —specifically, the International Road Transport Permits (EU Exit) Regulations—also catered for a no-deal Brexit. This instrument revokes and replaces the 2018 regulations.

The background to this is that, at the beginning of February 2022, new requirements provided in the TCA between the UK and the EU came into force. These changes apply to the operators of goods vehicles and their drivers involved in the commercial transport of goods within the territory of the EU and within the UK. Direct journeys between the UK and EU, and vice versa, are outside these requirements. For example, a journey by a UK operator from London to Paris is exempt from these requirements, but a journey made by a UK operator between Paris and Nice is not exempt. Similarly, an EU operator travelling from Berlin to Newcastle is exempt, but an EU operator travelling between Newcastle and Manchester is not and a posting declaration would have to be made.

Operators and drivers who are involved in making journeys affected by the TCA requirements are required to post information about this into a database, which will provide a declaration document that can be scrutinised by enforcement authorities across the European Union and within the UK when required. There is also a process to seek and check further information as part of enforcement procedures.

The instrument being debated today relates to the implementation of enforcement requirements associated with the posting of road transport workers, for UK operators undertaking journeys, including cabotage, in the EU using drivers that they employ directly. Reciprocal provisions applicable to EU operators working in Great Britain were implemented by the Goods Vehicles (Licensing of Operators) (Exemptions and Modifications) (Amendment) Regulations 2023, which came into force on 1 October 2023. Those regulations were laid before Parliament on 18 July 2023 under the negative procedure.

There are two principal areas of change. First, this instrument enables enforcement in the United Kingdom against in-scope UK operators who do not fulfil the requirements associated with the posting of transport workers. It is already possible for reported failings of licensed UK operators related to posting declarations to be considered by traffic commissioners in Great Britain and the authorities in Northern Ireland. This is further to provisions amended in 2022 about the repute of licensed operators. This assisted compliance with the relevant TCA provisions in the short term.

However, it is important to have a longer-term and more sustainable approach to demonstrate compliance with the TCA, which is vital to the UK’s international road haulage and the UK’s wider supply chains. Therefore, this instrument provides for specific enforcement related to posting declarations in some circumstances at the roadside. It also assists follow-up inquiries related to operators who have not co-operated with EU-based enforcement agencies. The agencies can contact the UK authorities to request follow-up action, and the TCA prescribes timelines for these to be dealt with in the UK. This instrument also covers goods vehicle operators not requiring an operator licence.

This instrument treats compliance with the posting requirements as a condition of making a specified journey and makes it an offence not to comply with the condition. The approach of making compliance with specified conditions a requirement is already taken for road haulage permits. That approach is part of the Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Act 2018. The position in relation to enforcement and fines largely mirrors the 2018 regulations, although a change has been made to enable the power to stop.

Secondly, this instrument revokes and replaces with updated provisions the International Road Haulage Permits (EU Exit) Regulations 2018. This is being done to reflect bilateral road transport agreements that the UK has implemented and ratified since 2018 with countries outside the EU, including Azerbaijan, parts of the former Yugoslavia, Switzerland and Ukraine.

The instrument makes other revisions to the 2018 provisions to improve clarity. Although many aspects provided for under this instrument, including the fee levels for permits, are the same as for the 2018 regulations, revoking and replacing the 2018 regulations as opposed to amending them provides for a clearer and more consolidated approach.

Returning to posting declarations, I highlight that the provisions apply to workers who are under a relevant contract, specifically those who are employees or workers. It is important to note that agency workers and self-employed workers, for example owner drivers, are not subject to postings requirements. This mirrors the scope in the EU regulations, which also carve agency drivers and self-employed drivers out of scope.

If a goods vehicle has two drivers—so-called double manning—a posting declaration can be required for both drivers, one driver or neither, depending on their employment status. The regulations apply only when they are undertaking journeys between two points in the European Union. Control officers in the EU can check the credentials of other drivers of UK-based vehicles during journeys within the EU. This would apply to self-employed drivers, for example. The inclusion of the posting procedures in the TCA limits the extent of EU controls on most drivers for UK-based goods vehicle operators on journeys within the EU. It prevents EU member states imposing other control measures. Before the EU legislation was put in place, there had been examples of EU member states putting more burdensome national requirements in place.

The regulations also facilitate the enforcement in the UK of the maximum number of internal journeys that UK operators can undertake within the EU under the TCA. This is limited to a maximum of two laden journeys following the laden arrival of a goods vehicle. Further restrictions apply to cabotage in the EU, which is journeys from one point to another in the same EU country.

These regulations are necessary to ensure that the UK upholds a key part of the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, thereby ensuring that movements of goods for trade can continue to take place between the UK and the EU. They also ensure that the UK’s bilateral agreements are reflected in legislation. I commend them to the Committee.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his explanation. I am sure he will forgive me a bit of a weary sigh, because I remember all this from the first time round. As it gradually dawned on us that the assurances that a post-Brexit trade deal would be the easiest trade deal in history were completely wrong, we realised that we were facing a much more complex set of rules and restrictions for the logistics industry, especially those smaller businesses that wanted to continue to trade with the EU.

Other sectors that have particularly suffered in recent years have been not just those trading from the UK to an EU country but, as the Minister explained, those wanting to operate cabotage services. A badly affected sector is performers—musicians and artists of various sorts—who have found it impossible to take their goods, vehicles, scenery, costumes and so on from one country to another. All this has contributed to a decline in the numbers trading and a deterioration in the balance of trade, which specifically has hit small businesses very hard.

Optimistically, I had hoped that we were over the worst and that we would gradually rebuild our trade, as people got used to the new restrictions. Apparently, that is not so, because this instrument appears to be tightening up the rules. The Minister’s introduction, which was very complex and detailed—and extremely helpful—underlined that this is going to carry on being complicated.

Paragraph 6.3 of the Explanatory Memorandum refers to

“the required outcome of the effective enforcement of posting requirements”,

so my first question to the Minister is: can he explain precisely how and to what extent the system was failing before? In a way, I am interested in the mood music behind this change. Have EU countries complained that UK operators are not doing it properly? Have we had international complaints, or are we complaining about EU operators coming here without the required permissions? What is the scenario that has led to these changes?

My Lords, I also thank the Minister for his presentation of this SI. He added a certain overview, which is useful. I found myself in a difficult situation with this SI, both because it is complicated and because the normal excellent support I get from the staff in our office was overwhelmed by the fact that the member of staff was doing Rwanda, so I had to try to do it myself.

I set about by trying to understand the thing. I do not know whether it is my age, and that I am just slowing down, but I found it very complex. It was not helped by the fact that the format of the Explanatory Memorandum has been changed—much to my surprise, because I learned the old one and knew where to go. That took me a little while to recover from, but eventually I found that Morag Rethans was my contact. We made contact and she helped me, over quite a long phone conversation, to work through the various bits of the agreement. Yesterday morning, I understood all parts of the SI. I do not think I understood them all at the same time, and my understanding of them has certainly faded a bit in the past 24 hours. I always like the contributions of the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, because she is so much more diligent than me and finds little corners in what has been happening.

In a sense, I was content to clarify my mind—the Minister may have to correct me on this—that this was a piece of domestic legislation which took the agreements that we have, particularly the TCA and agreements with other peripheral states, as a given. As far as I can see, there is nothing in this instrument that changes our formal relationship with the EU and those peripheral states. What it does is mend holes in our own regulations that make the interface with other states incomplete and messy. The solution is designed to ensure that UK domestic law fits with our international obligations. In particular, it gives an enforcement mechanism to ensure that its impact is uniform, both in the UK and reciprocally with visitors to the UK.