What is happening
On 1 December 2025, the European Commission published a proposal asking the Council to establish the position the EU would take in the Transport Community’s Regional Steering CommitteeThe Transport Community treaty body responsible for administering the treaty and ensuring its implementation. Each contracting party has a representative and alternate, and the committee acts unanimously.. The proposed position supports a draft change to purchasing rules used by the Transport Community Permanent Secretariat. The Council proposal would set the EU’s position; the Regional Steering Committee would make the separate decision amending the rules.21
The Commission says the draft amendment would simplify the process for certain contracts worth no more than €20,000, excluding VAT. The Commission also says it would add a rule making Directive 2014/24/EUAn EU directive containing public-procurement standards and the value threshold referenced by the secretariat’s rules. The planned amendment would make it apply where those rules contain no explicit provision.—the EU directive containing public-procurement standards and thresholds—apply whenever the secretariat’s own procurement rules contain no explicit provision. The proposal concerns goods, works or services bought on the secretariat’s own account below the directive’s threshold.2
The Commission reports that the secretariat linked the first change to difficulty attracting bidders for simple, low-value goods and services whose volume and delivery timing can be fixed in advance. The Commission says the current process requires an invitation to tender, full specifications and draft contracts, but usually brings one or no offers. The Commission lists venue hire, translation and equipment rental as examples.2
Why it matters
The proposed change is confined to the Permanent Secretariat’s own purchases and directly concerns potential bidders for those contracts. The €20,000 ceiling identifies certain contracts targeted for simplification; the proposal separately refers to the directive’s procurement threshold. The fallback to that directive addresses a different question: which standards apply when the secretariat’s rules contain no explicit provision.2
The Regional Steering Committee is the treaty body that administers the Transport Community and ensures the treaty is implemented. Each contracting party has a representative and alternate; EU member states may attend as observers, and the committee acts unanimously. Under the treaty, its decisions bind the contracting parties.2
What happens next
In its dated proposal, the Commission asked the Council to set the EU position on the draft committee decision. The proposal envisaged the Regional Steering Committee acting at its final meeting of 2025. It also said minor technical changes to the EU position could be agreed without another Council decision. If the committee adopted the amendment, the treaty requires its decisions to be published in the EU’s Official Journal and makes them binding on the contracting parties.2