Following the European Parliamentary vote on 20th November which ratified the final text of the Type Approval Regulation, the governments of the EU Member States have today approved the regulation as well.
Their statement can be read here.
There only remains the technical content of the new legislation, or Delegated Acts, to be written. Yes you read that correctly. The legislation which has been approved is yet to be completed.
The bureaucrats have until 2014 to complete the text which is effectively fait accompli. There is no opportunity to ammend the text in the delegated acts, as the only scrutiny system is that the Parliament accept or reject the text in entirety.
Complete rejection will not happen as this regulation is such a huge piece of legislation and the majority of it is not contentious.
The bits that are, such as those relating to the anti-tampering clauses which have no evidence to justify them, will therefore be forced through. It’ll be interesting to see the repercussions will be of what our Representatives have voted to accept, given that they too are unaware.