Road safety: anchorages of safety belts (amend. Directive 76/115/EEC)

 The committee adopted the report by its chairman, Paolo COSTA (ALDE, IT), broadly approving the Council's common position under the 2nd reading of the codecision procedure, subject to a few amendments designed to ensure mutual recognition for certain exemptions (side-facing seats) granted on a national basis for vehicles designed as conference buses and produced in small series or as individual vehicles. MEPs pointed out that such exemptions which can, but do not have to be, accepted by other national authorities can distort the market for the producers of the vehicles concerned, create excessive red tape and cause uncertainty for the owners of the vehicles. Automatic recognition would eliminate these inconveniences and probably lead to the setting of common minimum technical standards.

The committee therefore introduced a new Article 5a and amended the technical provisions of the relevant Annex.