What is the National Land Transport Council?

The National Land Transport Council is an upper body of the State Administration that deals in giving advice and answering queries about the functioning of the transport system, as well as a forum for debate in the sector.

It is responsible for the drawing-up of the relevant mandatory reports on all of those matters and questions that are provided for in Law 30/1987, of 30 July, on Land Transport Planning, the setting-up of this body, the drawing-up of its development regulations as approved by Royal Decree 1211/1990, of 28 September, and if further responsible for those matters deemed appropriate by the Government and by the Ministerio de Fomento.

Composition and Functioning

The Council is a mixed body: on the one hand, it has specialists in the field of land transport, who have been appointed on the basis of their expertise by the State Administration; on the other hand, it has representatives from various sectors that have an interest in land transport: Hauliers’ associations, Rail companies, Users, etc. and a total of 70 Advisors appointed by the Ministerio de Fomento, who have been proposed by the different departments that go to make up the Ministry.

Council Powers

The main responsibilities of the Council, pursuant to transport legislation, are:

• The giving of advice and the answering of queries on general aspects of the basic planning of the sector and on specific aspects of the various services, including those concerned with the economic policy shared by the different modes of transport with respect to the drawing-up of Transport Plans, the writing-up of standard contracts and the general contracting conditions for the different classes of land transport, as well as those relating to the pricing system.
• The Council is obliged to provide information on regular passenger transport, with respect to, among other things, the following matters:
  • The setting-up and awarding of permanent, general use regular services.
  • Modifications to authorised traffic in the granting of licences (extensions, partition deeds, withdrawal and traffic segregation, etc.).
  • The authorisation to jointly use a single vehicle subject to several licences that have points in common, but where their standardisation does not apply, with the aim in mind of avoiding any breach of continuity.
  • The redeeming, declaration of revocation and cancelling of licences.
  • The standardisation of licences.
  • The authorisation of special use regular transport, etc.
• The Council is also obliged to inform of those cases provided for by the Law on Land Transport Ordering Regulations (ROTT) concerning the transportation of goods, chartered transport and on auxiliary and complementary activities related to land transport.
• Moreover, with respect to rail transport, the Council has been requested to draw up a report on related state regulation projects, as well as on the transposition of European Directives.

Council Activity

Since it was set up on 28 February 1995, the Council has been involved in a wide range of activities, as can only be expected given the powers it has been granted. The scope of its activity is summarised in the following table, which indicates the meetings that were held since its setting-up in 1995 to 2002, as well as the number of reports, agreements and motions that have been adopted.

Council Secretariat

Both the Secretary, as well as the Council Secretariat support unit, in which all posts are held by civil servants, are attached to the General Technical Secretariat through the Department’s General Technical Vice-secretariat.