The Government approves a law to prevent carriers from working at a loss

Gives 'green light' to new aid of 450 million euros for the sector

MADRID, 1 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Government has approved a new law for the transport sector in which it transposes the inspiring principles of the so-called Food Chain Law to the relationships that exist between carriers and their customers, with the aim of preventing the former from working at a loss .

At the press conference after the Council of Ministers, the spokeswoman for the Executive, Isabel Rodríguez, stated that this measure deepens the commitments already adopted with the transport sector, with which it has negotiated in recent months and with which some remained matters to be done.

At the initiative of the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, the Executive has approved a decree to give the 'green light' to this new Law of the Transport Chain, which tries to correct the imperfections of the system that affect the part with less capacity of negotiation.

This part are the carriers, who, being atomized, mostly self-employed, agree negative conditions with their clients, generally with greater power, so in the end they end up working at a loss to avoid competition.

Among the main provisions is the obligation to collect the written contracts in which the price of the service appears, which must always be equal to or greater than the costs, in reference to a price system that the Ministry itself already publishes.

To ensure that this measure is complied with, new infractions and sanctions have been approved with respect to these obligations and the Government has made a commitment to expand the sector's code of good practices on subcontracting.

This last element is the one that has had the most discrepancies in the negotiations between the Ministry and the sector, represented in the National Committee for Road Transport (CNTC). Finally, the Government has given more time and has promised to analyze the effectiveness of these measures in six months and to present a bill on subcontracting.

Regarding the extension requested by the CNTC to 40 cents of the current discount of 20 cents on fuel, the Ministry defends that it would be unfeasible given European tax regulations.

Likewise, the Executive has again approved another package of direct aid, through an extraordinary loan of 450 million euros, which will translate into 1,250 euros per truck, 950 per coach, 500 euros per van, 300 per taxi, VTC and ambulance and 400 to urban buses.

On the other hand, in the maritime field, the Government has authorized a provision to consider Ukrainians as equivalent to European citizens and has authorized Spanish shipping companies to hire private security services from foreign companies for their protection against cases of piracy.