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On 15 December, the UK Government announced an extension of the current arrangements for moving goods from the island of Ireland to Great Britain. This means that goods moving from the island of Ireland, either from Ireland or Northern Ireland, directly to Great Britain will continue to do so on the basis of the arrangements that apply currently, until further notice; and will not, for now, be affected by the changes being introduced on 1 January 2022.

The past year has been a period of adaptation to a post-Brexit trading environment, where businesses on both sides of the Channel have worked hard to get to grips with the operational changes that came after the end of the transition period. As trade is now looking to embrace another portion of changes in GB’s relationship with the EU, it seems that the lack of readiness in supply chains for the upcoming new formalities and procedures remains, along with the somewhat familiar crippling fear that the new year will be met with operational chaos. However, further delays in the implementation of the Border Operating Model will only lead to further instability and confusion, and should therefore be avoided.

The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) published on 28 November a study analysing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of battery-electric trucks in the highest emitting road freight segment: long-distance tractor-trailers. The research covers seven European countries, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Poland, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, which accounted for more than 75% of truck sales in the European Union in 2019.

On 15 December, the European Commission adopted an extension to the slot relief rules for the 2022 summer scheduling season, running from 28 March 2022 until 29 October 2022. Instead of the normal requirement to use at least 80% of a given slot series, airlines will only have to use 64% to retain historic rights in those slots during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

CLECAT has given its response to the CountEmissionsEU initiative which sets out the Commission’s intention to initiate a common framework to calculate and report transport-related greenhouse gas emissions. CLECAT supports the objectives as outlined in the EC’s roadmap, in particular the establishment of a level playing field for GHG emissions accounting in the transport and logistics sectors to facilitate behaviour change.

CLECAT welcomes the Commission proposal setting out the new guidelines for the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T). The proposal, as part of the ‘efficient and green mobility package’ which was published on 14 December, supports the transition to cleaner, greener, and smarter mobility, in line with the objectives of the European Green Deal.

On 16 December a debate was held at the Plenary session of the European Parliament on barriers to international trade within the European Union. At the initiative of the IMCO committee, MEPs wanted to draw the attention of the European Commission on measures introduced by Member States such as border restrictions to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 and driving bans for environmental purposes disrupting traffic along the Brenner Pass.

Maersk and Hamburg Sud have announced that they will cease to provide services to certain freight forwarders from 1 January 2022 through named account contracts. This refusal to deal with a part of their customers base will apply to logistics service providers in order to increase the carriers’ direct business with shippers who would otherwise prefer to use freight forwarders to take care of their logistics supply chain needs.

On 6 December, the European Commission published the results for the open public consultation on the Data Act, the upcoming flagship initiative of the European Data Strategy. The responses show that while businesses engage in data sharing, data transactions are still held back by numerous obstacles of a technical or legal nature.