The committee adopted the report by its chairman, Giuseppe GARGANI (EPP-ED, I), amending the proposal under the 1st reading of the codecision procedure:
- approval procedures governed by the directive should be optional for vehicles for use principally on construction sites or in quarries, port or airport facilities, armoured vehicles for use by the army, civil defence and forces responsible for maintaining public order, mobile machinery, tracked vehicles, vehicles intended exclusively for racing on roads and prototypes of vehicles used by manufacturers to perform a specific test programme;
- whereas the Commission was proposing that the validity of an individual approval be restricted to the territory of the Member State which granted the approval, the committee added that, where there is an intention to register a vehicle in another Member State, it shall be presumed that the vehicle complies with the requirements imposed in the state of registration provided that an analysis of the documents supplied by the applicant together with the registration application does not rule out such compliance;
- to reduce the burden of the directive on small and medium sized enterprises, the committee recommended raising the annual production thresholds below which a simpler approval procedure applies (from 500 cars to 3000 cars in the case of EC type-approval and from 50 cars to 300 cars in the case of national type-approval) and lengthening the transition periods during which firms can make the necessary adjustments to comply with the legislation;
- the committee introduced a new provision specifying that, for identification purposes, each vehicle to be registered should be supplied with a unique, non-removable VIN code to be marked on the essential parts of the vehicle, and in several places which are easily accessible and legible to the emergency services;
- new provisions were introduced relating to the confidentiality of technical information;
- on the basis of the information which the Member States are due to supply by 31 March 2007 concerning the application of the type-approval procedures laid down in the directive, the Commission should report to Parliament and Council on the application of the directive by 1 October 2007. �