Paris (AFP)
Delage or 2 CV: the Senate voted on Thursday for a centrist bill aimed at creating a "historic" sticker for vintage vehicles, in order to allow them to circulate in areas limiting the circulation of the most polluting vehicles.
The text, adopted by show of hands at first reading despite an unfavorable opinion from the government, is however unlikely to prosper in the National Assembly.
The government wants to "preserve" these vehicles and that they can circulate, indicated the Minister in charge of Transport Jean-Baptiste Djebbari, but the proposed provisions fall under the "regulatory".
The Minister confirmed working with the French Federation of Vintage Vehicles (FFVE), in particular to better define vintage vehicles.
He further underlined that the low emission zones (EPZs) "all provide for exemptions".
"But, tomorrow, what will it be?" Asked the author of the bill Jean-Pierre Moga which defends an "industrial heritage".
The passion for vintage vehicles, shared by 250,000 collectors, "is not elitist," he said, citing the example of the "4 horses Renault" at "low" prices.
"We must give a legislative framework to this passion, so that this past so rich has a future, because if these vehicles can not run, this heritage will wither before disappearing", pleaded Gérard Longuet (LR).
"We are happy National 7", added Nadia Sollogoub (centrist) advancing a "tourist" argument.
"Let us not forget that some of our fellow citizens can no longer take a car, too polluting, to go to work," recalled for his part Jean-Claude Requier (RDSE with a radical majority).
For the ecologist Jacques Fernique, praising the German model, it is "possible to fit well, without creating a windfall effect, and thereby to reconcile the fight against pollution and the maintenance of a popular culture".
“Unfortunately, this bill does not take the right path,” he said.
And to conclude by invoking the song of Charles Trenet "At the garage door".
"Trenet was prophetic, yes strongly that in EPZs, peaceful and breathable, bikes sometimes encounter a poetic vintage car + by braking well, so as not to overtake (it) +".
© 2021 AFP