Gatz also doubts that Brussels city toll will come before 2024
The fact that Brussels is introducing its slim kilometer charge to this legislator is becoming more and more registration. After the Brussels Prime Minister Rudi Vervoort, Finance Minister Sven Gatz also states that 2024 will be difficult to achieve.
Will the Brussels city toll come in handy in 2022 after the next elections? This week, the Brussels government is considering the fate of its slim kilometer charge, which it renamed SmartMove. Minister of Finance and Budget Sven Gatz (Open VLD) still doubts that this legislation will see the light of day. Prime Minister Rudi Vervoort (PS) previously expressed doubts about an introduction before 2024.
Last week, the Council of State drafted a long-awaited advice that Brussels should in principle introduce the city toll on its own. That is an important boost, because from Flanders and Wallonia there was considerable criticism over Brussels for having announced its plans. Flemish and Walloon commuters have to pay the tax, they – in the case of the inhabitants of Brussels – do not receive lower road taxes in return.
The Council of State did insist on consultations between the federal states. This is in line with the line of Brussels Minister of Mobility Elke Van den Brandt (Green), who has always strived to introduce SmartMove with the consent of Wallonia and Flanders.
Conflicts of Interest
If the region continues with the plans, January 1, 2022, the previous deadline for SmartMove, will be too early in any case. The technology is poised to introduce the city toll sometime in 2022, but Gatz is counting on ten earliest to happen in early 2023. ‘And then we assume that we will do this without agreement with the other federal states,’ says Gatz.
In that case, the Brussels government still has to take into account a series of conflicts of interest that the other federal states will invoke. Flanders, Wallonia and the French Community can thus postpone the introduction. “With four conflicts of interest, we are still counting on delays until 2024. In we can introduce it three months after the elections,” says Gatz.