Directive 2015/413/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2015 facilitating cross-border exchange of information on road-safety-related traffic offences

On 19 March 2008, the Commission submitted to the Parliament and the Council a proposal for a directive seeking, in essence, to facilitate the exchange of information concerning certain road traffic offences and the crossborder enforcement of the sanctions attached to them. That proposal was based on the powers of the EU in relation to transport safety, namely Art. 91 paragraph 1 letter e) TFUE. On 25 October 2011, the Parliament and the Council adopted Directive 2011/82, using however as a legal basis the EU’s competence in the field of police cooperation, namely Art. 87 paragraph 2 TFUE. Taking the view that the directive had been adopted on the incorrect legal basis, the Commission brought annulment proceedings before the Court of Justice.

In its judgment C-43/12 Commission v Parliament and Council, the Court states that measures to improve road safety fall within transport policy. In fact, both in respect of its aim and its content, the directive is a measure to improve transport safety and should therefore have been adopted on that basis. Nonetheless, the Court considered that there were important grounds of legal certainty why the effects of that directive should be maintained until the entry into force, within a reasonable period of time — which may not have exceeded twelve months from the date of delivery of the judgment — of a new directive based on the correct legal basis (that is to say, transport safety).

The new Directive, based on Art. 91 paragraph 1 letter c) TFUE, sets up a procedure for the exchange of information between Member States in relation to eight road traffic offences (speeding, non-use of a seat-belt, failing to stop at a red traffic light, drink-driving, driving under the influence of drugs, failing to wear a crash helmet, use of a forbidden lane and illegally using a mobile telephone). The Member States may thus access each other's national data concerning vehicle registration in order to determine the person liable for the offence.