Safety at work: work equipment, minimum requirements (amend. Directive 89/655/EEC)

The Commission's amended proposal incorporates, in full or in part, 43 of the 50 amendments adopted by the European Parliament at first reading. - The amendments accepted by the Commission clarify the proposal as regards information for workers and the objectives of certain requirements. These amendments relate in particular to the following points: . Annex I: additional requirements for using woodworking and allied machinery (mainly presses), mobile equipment with ride-on workers, inadvertent seizure of drive units in machinery, lighting and visibility in or in contact with certain devices, equipment for lifting workers, scaffolding (including ladders); . Annex II: additional requirements for protecting work equipment against lightning strike (grounding system), rescue procedure in the event of dangerous contact (prior draining or ventilation of dangerous site), mobile equipment fitted with a combustion engine (engine cuts out when equipment is not in use), equipment which can be dismantled (sufficient stability of equipment on the ground); . Annex IV: work equipment subject to inspection: mobile equipment which cannot exceed speeds of 10 km/h and loads of lifting equipment which cannot lift loads in excess of 200 kg; . the Commission also agreed to take account of ergonomic principles, to tighten criteria governing the integration of work equipment into inspection plans (Annex IV), and to take account of the view of the social partners. - Although it agreed to extend the deadline by which "specific" existing work equipment (as covered by Annex I, part III) must comply with all the requirements of the directive to the end of the year 2000, the Commission did not agree that this equipment must be scrapped after 5 years (i.e. in 2005 as recommended by Parliament). . The Commission also rejected several amendments, including those relating to "qualified personnel", inspections before equipment is commissioned, the committee procedures and ad hoc procedures for consulting and training workers using certain types of equipment. . Other amendments were rejected because they were deemed excessively costly (rejection of parts, cartridge sealing tools, protection against agricultural vehicles from rolling over, marking lifting equipment and information for workers). . Finally, the Commission did not accept horizontal amendments seeking to extend the directive to "persons" in general (rather than just workers) because it felt that it went beyond the scope of Article 118A of the Treaty. . Similarly, the amendment on maintenance logs, which had resulted from translation problems, was also rejected.�