NordenBladet —
Chairman of the European Union Affairs Committee Peeter Tali pointed out that the purpose of the initiative was to strengthen passenger protection, encourage the use of public transport and thus contribute to the Green Deal goals by reducing CO2 emissions.
“Within Estonia, nothing will change for the time being for Auntie Maali and Uncle Fyodor, as well as for the Estonian transporters whose journeys within Estonia are shorter than 250 kilometres. At the same time, on international journeys and, in the future, on combined journeys by different transport modes in connection with Rail Baltic, passengers’ rights must be guaranteed in a uniform manner across Europe,” Tali said.
“Our aim is to ensure that the final text of the regulation would correspond to Estonia’s interests, with an emphasis on avoiding an increase in administrative burden and expenses for Estonian businesses,” Tali underlined. “We do not want fundamental changes in the passenger data collection, but we consider it necessary to set a clear term for the storage of personal data,” the Chairman added.
The amendments to the European Union Regulations are primarily meant for the protection of the rights of passengers, for example when buying air and rail travel as a single package. In the future, when buying such a multimodal ticket, the same rights will apply to customers as currently apply in the case of air travel. In the event a journey is cancelled, the passengers must be offered the possibility of re-routing or reimbursement of the cost of the ticket, and a compensation may also be paid by the carrier. Besides that, it is important to inform passengers of delay or cancellation as early as possible, so that they could respond to changes in travel times when necessary and make new arrangements.
Minister of Regional Affairs and Agriculture Piret Hartman and Head of the Public Transport Department of the Ministry of Regional Affairs and Agriculture Andres Ruubas gave an overview of the proposals for regulations on the rights of passengers and the common European mobility data space, and the positions of the Government.
The European Union Affairs Committee decided by consensus to support the positions presented by the Government, considering the opinion of the Economic Affairs Committee of the Riigikogu.
Riigikogu Press Service
Merilin Kruuse
+372 631 6592; +372 510 6179
merilin.kruuse@riigikogu.ee
Questions: press@riigikogu.ee
Link uudisele: European Union Affairs Committee supports improving protection of passengers on combined journeys
Source: Parliament of Estonia