No C 269/34 Official Journal of the European Communities 14. 10. 91 
Opinion on the proposal for a Council Regulation amending Regulation (EEC) No 4060/89 
on the elimination of controls performed at the frontiers of Member States in the field of 
road and inland waterway transport (1) 
(91/C 269/11) 
On 29 April 1991 the Council decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under 
Article 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on the abovementioned 
proposal. 
The Section for Transport and Communications, which was responsible for preparing the 
Committee's work on this subject, adopted its Opinion on 12 June 1991. The Rapporteur 
was Mr Whitworth. 
At its 288th plenary session (meeting of 3 July 1991) the Economic and Social Committee 
unanimously adopted the following Opinion. 
1. Introduction 
1.1. Regulation (EEC) No 4060/89 of 21 December 
1989 (2) entered into force on 1 July 1990. It provides 
that certain controls, referred to in the Annex to the 
Regulation, on road vehicles and inland waterway craft, 
should no longer be performed as frontier controls, but 
solely as part of normal control procedures applied in 
a non-discriminatory manner throughout the territory 
of a Member State. 
1.2. The controls in question relate to the enforce­
ment of certain Community Directives and Regulations 
concerning, for example, weights, dimensions and road-
worthy tests for road vehicles, technical requirements 
for inland waterway vessels, rules for coach and bus 
services, the application of social legislation, the use of 
recording equipment, etc. National controls on driving 
licences of the drivers of such vehicles are also covered. 
1.3. The Regulation forms part of the Commission's 
programme for implementing the establishment of the 
Internal Market in the field of road transport, with 
particular reference to the goal of the free movement 
of persons and goods across frontiers and the removal 
of all artificial barriers thereto. 
1.4. The present proposal seeks to extend the 1989 
Regulation to cover (and hence to eliminate as frontier 
controls) technical checks and controls required by 
certain International Conventions. These relate to the 
International Carriage of Dangerous Goods and the 
International Carriage of Perishable Foodstuffs. Both 
of these are governed by European Agreements adopted 
under the United Nations Economic Commission for 
Europe. It is proposed that the Annex to the amended Regulation will now include the detailed inspection 
requirements for the enforcement of these Conventions. 
1.5. Hence, Member States will be required to carry 
out these controls internally in a non-discriminatory 
manner rather than as frontier controls. 
2. General comments 
2.1. In its Opinion on the proposal for the original 
Council Regulation, adopted on 1 June 1989 (3), the 
Economic and Social Committee endorsed the Com­
mission's proposal and considered it essential that by 
1992 the Community's internal frontiers should no 
longer act as a barrier to the international carriage of 
persons or goods. Indeed, it called on the Commission 
to push ahead with the reduction of some of the other 
controls which are still carried out at the Community's 
internal frontiers. 
2.2. The Committee considers that the present pro­
posal is consistent with the philosophy which it adopted 
in its 1989 Opinion and therefore should be similarly 
supported. 
2.3. However the Committee is concerned, as it was 
in 1989, that goods and passenger transport should not 
be subjected to excessive delays by being required to 
undergo repeated random checks. Accordingly it rec­
ommends that the present amending Regulation should 
add to Council Regulation (EEC) No 460/89 a proviso 
that a certificate issued by the proper Authority of a 
Member State that a vehicle was subjected to a technical 
inspection at the start of, or at some stage during, its 
journey and found to comply with the relevant pro­
visions of the Annex to the Regulation (as now to be 
amended) should be accepted by the relevant Authori­
ties of other Member States as confirmation of com­
pliance, thus obviating the necessity for further random 
checks in the course of the same journey. 
(*) OJ No C 117, 1. 5. 1991, p. 6. 
(2) OJ No L 390, 30. 12. 1989, p. 18. (3) OJ No C 194, 31. 7. 1989, p. 24. 
14.10. 91 Official Journal of the European Communities No C 269/35 
2.4. While noting that the Council Regulation (EEC) 
No 4060/89 is concerned only with inspection checks 
of the technical state of the vehicle and its load, the 
Committee repeats the call to the Commission which 
it made in its 1989 Opinion to press ahead with the 
reduction of some of the other controls which are still 
carried out at the Community's internal frontiers, such 
as veterinary and plant-health controls. 
3. Specific comments 
3.1. The Committee believes that the Commission 
should clarify the precise meaning of the first indent 
under paragraph (b)(iv) of the Annex:—'Overload 
(according to tank capacity).' 
3.2. The Committee calls on the Commission to 
make the following changes/corrections to Part 2 of the 
Annex: 
Done at Brussels, 3 July 1991. (i) Documents 
Insert 'Tanker' before 'driver's'. 
Replace 'Safety instructions' by 'Hazards chart'. 
Approval certificate for tanker transport and 
Type II vehicles — transport document to be mar­
ked: 'In conformity with ADR standards'. 
(iii) Replace 'Additional fire extinguisher' by 'Fire 
extinguisher(s)'. 
Replace 'Special equipment' by 'Equipment in con­
formity with ADR 260'. 
The Chairman 
of the Economic and Social Committee 
Francis STAEDELIN