The deadline for test plates for vehicles that have yet to be registered has been extended until November 30th.
It has been announced by The Ministry of Infrastructure in a note stressing that the waiver was signed by the Director General of the Vehicle Registration Authority, responsible for Central Italy, in response to the pressing test plate issue in Livorno port. The reduction in the number of test plates from one for every employee to one for every five employees could have severely affected port companies authorized to handle vehicles entering and leaving ships even over the next few days.
Port Network Authority Managing Director Matteo Paroli was highly satisfied: “Our teamwork with the Prefecture and Livorno Municipality has paid off,” he said.
“Together with our Prefect, Mr. Dionisi and our Mayor, Mr. Salvetti, on a number of occasions we pointed out to the Ministry of Infrastructure & Transport what the possible consequences of not extending the test plate deadline could have been. The risk was that our port would have come to a standstill, with serious, direct repercussions on the efficiency of our port operations, on the receptive capacity of our yards, on the competitiveness of the port companies themselves as well as on employment levels and local social dynamics,” he added.
“We have been so effective in representing the Livorno emergency that the government has granted us an extension of our test plate circulation permits as an exclusive response to the needs of our port,” Mr. Paroli remarked.
“It cannot be ruled out that Livorno could play the role of trailblazer in terms of extensions, should the same problems emerge in other ports of call. We are now waiting for parliament to re-open again to pass a decree-law that would definitively exempt the port from the general regulations on test plates (which, instead, are applicable to other sectors) as the government has already assured us on various occasions.”
Translation by Giles Foster