THE EUROPEAN TOLL OPERATORS ASK FOR RELIABLE REGULATIONS

ASECAP, the association gathering toll operators from France, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Austria, Greece and a number of other European Nations, deems absolutely necessary the achievement of a set of stable rules, allowing investors to deploy reliable long term plans, without which the involvement of private funding in the development of the Trans-European networks would be no more than an illusion.    Since the development of infrastructures by means of PPP is strictly interlaced with the capitals markets – debt and equity markets -, the infrastructure sector cannot be dealt with as an isolated one, but rather taking into account all the discipline and constraints related to the rules governing financial markets.    It is therefore needed, in order that the EU infrastructure market becomes a common one, to prevent national initiatives from wading into Principles and Policies that proved to be succesful in other sectors, such as in telecommunications, thus disrupting from the very basis one of the pillars of the EU growth, therefore preventing mobility and economic growth.    The European Toll Infrastructures operators, during the opening session of their annual meeting, in Crete (Greece) asked the President of the Transport Committee of the European Parliament, Prof. Paolo Costa and the Director for Land Transport of the European Commission, Mr. Enrico Grillo-Pasquarelli, clear and reliable rules as a precondition for the implementation of the EU policies towards PPP and the private financing of the TENs.