Parliament debates five PSD diplomas on “the safe use of motorcycles”. There are those who applaud, there are those who contest.
Assembly of the Republic debates today diplomas of the PSD which aim to promote “the use with security of the motorcycles” and eliminate the mandatory inspection for these vehicles in the Traffic Code, which never came into force.
In a debate marked in a powerful way by the PSD, two bills and three resolutions (without the force of law) will be under discussion, with the Social Democrats recommending to the Government, for example, the reduction of the Single Circulation Tax (IUC) for motorcycles or the creation of a own class nas tolls for these vehicles.
One of the PSD diplomas remove a mandatory provided for in a 2012 decree-law to subject “motorcycles, tricycles and quadricycles with a cylinder capacity exceeding 250 cm3, as well as trailers and semi-trailers weighing more than 750 kg”, which never came into force as it depends on an ordinance.
“Sometimes it remained in a drawer, other times there were no regulations, other times because the inspection centers themselves did not know how they could address these issues. We want to eliminate this situation once and for all, to stop this obligation that was going to start in January 2025 for motorcycles and, as a consequence, we created a set of safety measures”, explained Gonçalo Laje.
The PSD deputy highlights that the 2014 European directive that regulates this matter presupposes, in alternative inspections, the implementation of security.
“What the PSD wants is to act on 99.7% of the problem and not on 0.3% of the problem,” he said, citing studies that state that mandatory technical inspections of motorcycles are irrelevant in reducing the number of traffic deaths.
But, on this subject, Paulo Areal, President of the National Association of Automotive Inspection Centers, speaks in investment that will now be useless: “The entities that generate the inspection centers invested 30 million eurosuntil 2016″, he recalled, at TSF.
Another of the measures proposed by the PSD involves a bill to amend the Traffic Code in order to universalize motorcycle access to BUS tracks, which currently depends on each City Council.
The Social Democrats also recommend that the Government implement security measures such as elimination of slippery materials in expansion joints on the roads, the creation of own vertical signage for motorcyclists (for example, alerting to the existence of rails) or elimination of bollards and of separators of roads next to the road, considered “lethal weapons for motorcyclists”.
The other two resolutions presented by the PSD recommend that the government create its own exclusive class for motorcycles for the purpose of paying tolls – with a cost not exceeding 50% of the value corresponding to class 1 – and that these vehicles also pay, at least , only half of the IUC currently charged on low-displacement gasoline passenger cars.
The PSD had informed at a conference of leaders that would not allow dragging of diplomas from other benchesso the proposals presented this week by the PS and PCP on motorcycles will not be discussed today by the Assembly of the Republic.
