S.L. 499.56 Art. 2Interpretation.

For the purpose of these regulations and unless the context otherwise requires:

"the Act" means the Authority for Transport in Malta Act;

"authorisation" means any permission given by the Authority or the competent authorities in Member States entitling the holder to carry out road passenger transport operations;

"authorised parking disc" means a cardboard device as indicated in the Seventeenth Schedule having a revolving disc which displays, through a window in the outer cover, a twelve (12)-hour clock with indicators for segments of fifteen (15) minutes each inscribed on the inner disc, and which is collected free of charge from the offices of the

Authority upon the collection of the relative licence for the operator or driver or from an authorised service provider indicated by the

Authority on its official website;

"authorised inspecting officer" means a Police officer, a community officer or an officer of the Authority; "authorised commercial premises" means any commercial premises as defined by the Trading Licences Act and which is licensed to carry out any commercial activity in terms of the Trading Licences Regulations; and for the purpose of these regulations includes also any building, premises or other establishment which is licensed in terms of the Malta Travel and

Tourism Services Act; "the Authority" means the Authority for Transport in Malta as established by the Act; "break" means any period during which a driver may not carry out any driving or any other work and which is used exclusively for recuperation; "bus operator" means an operator authorized to provide public passenger transport services in terms of regulation 68B; "bus stop" means any stopping point situated along a public passenger transport route at which a motor route bus may take passengers on board or allow passengers to disembark;

"cabotage transport operations" means the performing of national carriage of passengers by road for hire or reward within Malta by a non-resident carrier who holds a Community authorization; such activity shall not be permanent, frequent, regular or continuous, shall not be carried out systematically, shall be at considerable and infrequent intervals, and the vehicle involved shall leave Malta at least once a month; "carriage by road" means any journey made entirely or in part on roads open to the public by a vehicle, whether laden or not, used for the carriage of passengers;

"carriageway" means that part of a roadway on which traffic proceeds in a single direction;

"carrier" means any physical or legal person who is authorized under the laws of a Member State to engage in the carriage of passengers by road using passenger transport vehicles for hire or reward or on his own account; "coach" means a passenger transport vehicle which has at least thirty passenger seats, in addition to the driver’s seat; "collective agreement" means an agreement entered into between an employer, or one or more organisations of employers, and one or more organisations of employees regarding conditions of employment in accordance with the provisions of any law in force in Malta; "Community licence" means a licence issued by the competent authorities of a Member State to a carrier established in that Member State in accordance with Article 3a of Council Regulation

(EC) No 11/98 amending Regulation (EEC) No 684/92 on common rules for the international carriage of passengers by coach and bus; "company" has the same meaning as is assigned to it in article 2 of the Companies Act; "co-operative society" means a co-operative society registered or provisionally registered under the Co-operative Societies Act; "country of establishment" means that country in which the nonresident carrier is established and registered; "daily driving time" means the total accumulated driving time between the end of one daily rest period and the beginning of the following daily rest period or between a daily rest period and a weekly rest period; "daily rest period" means the daily period during which a driver may freely dispose of his time and covers a "regular daily rest period" and a "reduced daily rest period" as defined under these regulations;

"designated person" means a natural person, designated to the Authority by an operator or an applicant for an operator’s licence, as the person who continuously and effectively manages the road passenger transport operations; "Directive 2002/15/EC" means Directive 2002/15/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2002 on the organisation of the working time of persons performing mobile road transport activities; ''Directive 2005/55/EC'' means Directive 2005/55/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 28 September 2005 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to the measures to be taken against the emission of gaseous and particulate pollutants from compression ignition engines for use in vehicles, and the emission of gaseous pollutants from positive ignition engines fuelled with natural gas or liquefied petroleum gas for use in vehicles;''; and "Directive 2006/22/EC" means Directive 2006/22/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on minimum conditions for the implementation of Regulations (EC) No 561/2006 and (EU) No 165/2014 and Directive 2002/15/EC as regards social legislation relating to road transport activities, and repealing Council Directive 88/599/EEC, as amended by Directive (EU) 2024/ 846; "Directive (EU) 2024/846" means Commission Delegated Directive

(EU) 2024/846 of 14 March, 2024 amending Directive 2006/22/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on minimum conditions for the implementation of Regulations (EC) No 561/2006 and (EU) No 165/2014 and Directive 2002/15/EC as regards social legislation relating to road transport activities;

"driver" means any person who drives a passenger transport vehicle for hire or reward even for a short period, or who is carried in the vehicle as part of his duties in order to be available for driving if necessary; "driver card (with memory)" shall have the same meaning assigned to it by the Motor Vehicles (Weights, Dimensions and Equipment) Regulations;

"driver’s permit" means a permit granted to a driver by the Authority in terms of Part III of these regulations;

"driving period" means the accumulated driving time from when a driver commences driving following a rest period or a break until he takes a rest period or a break. The driving period may be continuous or broken; "driving time" means the duration of driving activity recorded automatically or semi-automatically by the recording equipment as defined in the Malta Vehicles (Weights, Dimensions and

Equipment) Regulations or recorded manually as required by regulation 37 of the said regulations; "electric trolley vehicle" means an electrically propelled vehicle which is used for the carriage of passengers by road which -

(a) has been issued with a type approval certificate by a competent authority of a Member State or by any other body approved by the Authority authorizing such vehicle for use on the road for the carriage of passengers;

(b) for the purposes of these regulations has a maximum speed which does not exceed 25km/hr; and

(c) fulfils all the applicable specifications and construction requirements established in the Motor Vehicles (Weights, Dimensions and Equipment) Regulations;

"electric trolley vehicle maximum fare" means the maximum fare to be levied for transport services rendered by means of electric trolley vehicles as specified in the Fifteenth Schedule; "electric trolley vehicle stand" means an area specially designated and marked as such by the Authority where electric trolley vehicles can stand for hire; "entry fee" means the fee payable in terms of regulation 117 upon application for a passenger transport vehicle licence; "employer" means the person by whom a worker is, or, where the employment has ceased, was employed, and includes a partnership, company, co-operative society, association or other body of persons, whether vested with legal personality or not;

"enforcement officer" means an officer appointed by the Authority in terms of article 4(3) of the Act;

"European Union" has the same meaning as is given to it in the European Union Act and for the purposes of these regulations includes Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein; "hire or reward" means the carriage of passengers other than on own account, that is to say against payment or compensation by the person transported or by the transport organiser, whether such payment or compensation is made directly or indirectly;

"hirer" means the passenger or the transport organiser, as applicable;

"international passenger transport services" means the performance of passenger transport services between two or more states. "Local Council" means a Local Council established under the Local Government Act; "locality" shall have the same meaning assigned to it by the Local Government Act; "Malta heritage bus" means a passenger transport vehicle having its coachwork manufactured in Malta and having been registered in Malta as a passenger transport vehicle prior to 1 January, 1975 and was registered as such for at least five consecutive years at any time prior to the coming into force of these regulations and which:

(a) is not licensed as a vintage bus in terms of Part X; and

(b) has not, at any point in time, been scrapped or garaged and had its registration plates as a passenger transport vehicle used on another vehicle in replacement thereof; ""maximum fares" means the maximum fares indicated in the Twelfth Schedule payable by a passenger for a public passenger transport service;; "maximum passenger capacity" means the seating and standing passenger capacity of a passenger transport vehicle as established by the manufacturer of that vehicle;

"Member State" means a Member State of the European Union; "minibus" means a passenger transport vehicle which has not more than twenty-nine (29) passenger seats, in addition to the driver’s seat; "mobile worker" means any worker forming part of the travelling staff, including trainees and apprentices, who is in the service of an undertaking which operates transport services for passengers by road for hire or reward or on its own account and includes any driver who is not a self-employed driver;

"motor route bus" means a passenger transport vehicle licensed to operate a public passenger transport service;

"motor route bus inspector" means a person engaged by the bus operator and having the powers and duties stipulated in these regulations; "motor route bus licence" means a licence issued by the Authority, authorizing a passenger transport vehicle to be used as a motor route bus for the purpose of providing a public passenger transport service;

"motor vehicle" means any self-propelled vehicle travelling on the road, other than a vehicle permanently running on rails, and normally used for the carriage of passengers the maximum designed speed of which exceeds 45 kilometers per hour; "multi-manning" means the situation where, during each period of driving between any two consecutive daily rest periods, or between a daily rest period and a weekly rest period, there are at least two drivers in the vehicle to do the driving. For the first hour of multi-manning the presence of another driver or drivers is optional but for the remainder of the period it is compulsory;

"M2 motor vehicle" means a motor vehicle comprising more than eight seats in addition to the driver’s seat, and having a maximum mass not exceeding 5 tonnes; "M3 motor vehicle" means a motor vehicle comprising more than eight seats in addition to the driver’s seat, and having a mass exceeding 5 tonnes; "national occasional services" means national passenger transport services which do not fall within the definition of regular services and, or special regular services, and whose main characteristic is that they carry groups constituted on the initiative of a customer or of the carrier himself; these services shall not cease to be occasional services solely because they are provided at specified intervals; "national passenger transport services" means the performance of passenger transport services solely within the territory of Malta; "national type approval" shall have the same meaning as assigned to it in Regulation (EU) 2018/858; "new motor vehicle" means, for the purposes of these regulations, a motor vehicle which:

(a) has never been registered in any country;

(b) has been registered only once (1) in any other country provided that:

(i) it has not been driven with its own motor for more than six thousand kilometres (6,000km); and

(ii) it shall be effectively registered as a new motor vehicle in Malta within three (3) months from the effective date of the first registration of the new motor vehicle in the other country;

"night time" means a period of four hours between 01.00 and 05.00;

"night work" shall mean any work performed during night time; "non-personalised public transport card" means a card, other than the personalised public transport card, which is issued by the bus operator and utilised by a passenger for the public passenger transport services indicated in Table 3 of the Twelfth Schedule; "normal residence" means the place where a person habitually lives, for at least 185 days in each calendar year, because of personal and occupational ties, or, in the case of a person with no occupational ties, because of personal ties which show close links between that person and the place where he is living; provided that, the normal residence of a person whose occupational ties are in a different place from his personal ties and who consequently lives in turn in different places situated in two or more Member States shall be regarded as being the place of his personal ties, provided that such person returns there regularly; this last condition need not be met where the person is living in an Member State in order to carry out a task of a definite duration; attendance at a university or school shall not imply taking up of normal residence;

"occasional services" in the context of international carriage of passengers by road means services which do not fall within the definition of regular services, including special regular services, and whose main characteristic is that they carry groups constituted on the initiative of a customer or of the carrier himself; these services shall not cease to be occasional services solely because they are provided at specified intervals; "occupation of road passenger transport operator" shall mean the activity of any undertaking operating, by means of motor vehicles so constructed and equipped as to be suitable for carrying more than nine persons - including the driver - and intended for that purpose, passenger transport services for the public or for specific categories of users for hire or reward;

"open top bus" means an open top, single or double deck passenger transport vehicle;

"operating centre" means the administrative offices from which the operator co-ordinates and controls the passenger transport services it supplies and in which all records relating to such services are kept; "operator" means a person, whether natural or legal, who is authorised by the Authority to carry out passenger transport services in terms of these regulations and includes self-employed drivers; "operator’s licence" means a national operator’s licence or a Community licence issued by the Authority to national undertakings authorizing the holder thereof to carry out passenger transport services;

"other work" means all activities as defined in the definition "working time" except driving, including any work for the same or another employer, within or outside the transport sector; "own account transport operations" means those passenger transport operations carried out for non-commercial and non-profit making purposes by a natural or a legal person, provided that the following conditions are fulfilled:

(a) the transport activity is only ancillary to the overall activities of the undertaking; and

(b) the vehicles used are the property of that natural or legal person or have been obtained on deferred terms by them or have been the subject of a long-term leasing contract and are driven by a member of the staff of the natural or legal person or by the natural person himself; "partnership" includes an association, not registered under the Companies Act, between two or more persons; "parking disc" means a cardboard device as defined in the Fourth Schedule of the Controlled Parking Schemes (Residents and

Commercial) Regulations; "passenger" means a person travelling in a passenger transport vehicle and who is not the driver or a person making use of a public lift or of scheduled passenger maritime services, as the case may be; "passenger seat" means any seat on a passenger transport vehicle which is not the driver’s seat; "passenger transport services" means the carriage of passengers using passenger transport vehicles for hire or reward; "passenger transport vehicle" means an M2 or M3 motor vehicle which, by virtue of its type of construction and equipment, is suitable for carrying passengers, and is intended for that purpose and, unless otherwise specified, includes a trackless train and an electric trolley vehicle; "passenger transport vehicle licence" means a document issued by the Authority certifying that the passenger transport vehicle is authorised to carry passengers for hire or reward, in terms of these regulations;

"periods of availability" means periods other than those relating to break times and rest periods during which the mobile worker is not required to remain at his workstation, but must be available to answer any calls to start or resume driving or to carry out other work, including such periods during which the mobile worker is accompanying a vehicle being transported by ferryboat or by train as well as periods of waiting at frontiers and those due to traffic prohibitions; "personalised public transport card" means a personalised card which is issued by the bus operator and utilised by the passenger in whose name the card is registered for the public passenger transport services indicated in Table 1 of the Twelfth Schedule;

"persons performing mobile road transport activities" means any mobile worker or self-employed driver who performs such road transport activities; "ply for hire" means to drive on the road to search for or be available for hire; "priority vehicle lane" means an area of carriageway which may only be used by vehicles licensed to carry passengers for hire or reward by the Authority; "public lift" means a lift which is operated for hire or reward for the transport of passengers from one public place situated at a lower level to another public place situated at a higher level, and vice-versa;

"public passenger transport service" means the regular passenger transport services of general economic interest provided in Malta to the public on a non-discriminatory and continuous basis; "public passenger transport route" means a route established by the Authority and, or notified to the Authority by the bus operator, and which forms part of the public passenger transport service; "public transport card" means a personalised transport card and a non-personalised transport card; "public transport ticket" means a ticket issued by the bus operator and utilised by a passenger for the public passenger transport services in Table 2 of the Twelfth Schedule;

"public highway" means national, arterial, distributory, access and local access roads as defined in the Motor Vehicles (Driving

Licences) Regulations, or comparable roads in other states; "recording equipment" or "tachograph" shall have the same meaning as that assigned to them in the Motor Vehicles (Weights, Dimensions and Equipment) Regulations; "reduced daily rest period" means any period of rest of at least nine hours but less than eleven hours; "reduced weekly rest period" means any period of rest of less than forty-five hours, which may, subject to the conditions laid down in regulation 75, be reduced to a minimum of twenty-four consecutive hours; "regular daily rest period" means any period of rest of at least eleven hours. Alternatively, this regular daily rest period may be taken in two periods, the first of which must be an uninterrupted period of at least three hours and the second an uninterrupted period of at least nine hours; "regular passenger services" means national and international services which provide for the carriage of passengers at specified intervals along specified routes, passengers being taken on board or disembarking at predetermined stopping points;

"regular weekly rest period" means any period of rest of at least forty-five hours;

"Regulation (EC) No 561/2006" means Regulation (EC) No 561/ 2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the harmonisation of certain social legislation relating to road transport and amending Council Regulations (EEC) No 3821/85 and

(EC) No 2135/98 and repealing Council Regulation (EEC) No 3820/ 85; ''Regulation (EC) No 595/2009'' means Regulation (EC) No 595/ 2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 June 2009 on type-approval of motor vehicles and engines with respect to emissions from heavy duty vehicles (Euro VI) and on access to vehicle repair and maintenance information and amending Regulation (EC) No 715/2007 and Directive 2007/46/EC and repealing Directives 80/ 1269/EEC, 2005/55/EC and 2005/78/EC; "Regulation (EC) No 1071/2009" means Regulation (EC) No 1071/ 2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 October 2009 establishing common rules concerning the conditions to be complied with to pursue the occupation of road transport operator and repealing Council Directive 96/26/EC; "Regulation (EU) No 1024/2012" means Regulation (EU) No 1024/ 2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2012 on administrative cooperation through the Internal Market Information System and repealing Commission Decision 2008/49/EC ("the IMI Regulation"); "Regulation (EU) No 165/2014" means Regulation (EU) No 165/ 2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 4 February 2014 on tachographs in road transport, repealing Council Regulation

(EEC) No 3821/85 on recording equipment in road transport and amending Regulation (EC) No 561/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the harmonisation of certain social legislation relating to road transport;

"Regulation (EU) 2018/858" means Regulation (EU) 2018/858 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 on the approval and market surveillance of motor vehicles and their trailers, and of systems, components and separate technical units intended for such vehicles, amending Regulations (EC) No 715/2007 and (EC) No 595/2009 and repealing Directive 2007/46/EC; "rest" means any uninterrupted period during which the driver may freely dispose of his time; "road" means any road, street, lane, square, or other place of public thoroughfare; "road passenger transport operation" means the economic activity of offering and carrying out passenger transport services; "road transport activities" shall include driving, assisting passengers boarding and disembarking the vehicle, cleaning and technical maintenance, and all other work intended to ensure the safety of the vehicle, its passengers or to fulfil the legal, or regulatory obligations directly linked to the specific transport operations under way, including dealing with administrative formalities with police, customs and immigration officers;

"seat belt" shall have the same meaning assigned to it in the Motor Vehicles (Wearing of Seat Belts) Regulations;

"scheduled passenger maritime transport services" means passenger transport services operated for hire or reward for the transport of services by sea, to and from such berthing places as may be established by the Authority from time to time, which are operated according to scheduled times;

"school children" means all children attending schools providing tuition up to a secondary level of education;

"self-drive vehicle" means a passenger transport vehicle which is licensed and/or registered to be hired for the purpose of being driven by the hirer; "self-employed driver" means anyone whose main occupation is to transport passengers by road for hire or reward within the meaning of European Union legislation under cover of a Community licence or any other professional authorisation to carry out the aforementioned transport, who is entitled to work for himself and who is not tied to an employer by an employment contract or by any other type of working hierarchical relationship, who is free to organise the relevant working activities, whose income depends directly on the profits made and who has the freedom, individually or through a cooperation between self-employed drivers, to have commercial relations with several customers; "sightseeing passenger transport route" means a route established and published by the Authority and which may be used by operators for the purpose of taking passengers to and from sites and attractions in Malta and having a number of pre-determined pick-up and drop-off points, none of which are within five hundred metres from the main entrance of any building licensed as a hotel in terms of the Malta Travel and Tourism Services Act, and does not include public passenger transport routes; "special regular services" means regular services which provide for the carriage of specified categories of passengers, to the exclusion of other passengers, at specified intervals along specified routes, passengers boarding and disembarking at predetermined stopping points. They shall include inter alia:

(a) the carriage of workers between home and work;

(b) carriage to and from an educational institution for school pupils and students;

(c) the carriage of soldiers and their families between their homes and the area of their barracks;

"tail-lift van" means a passenger transport vehicle which, before first registration for use on the road was permanently fitted with a mechanical device which is designed to facilitate the boarding of wheelchair-bound passengers; "tracking device" means a device which monitors and transmits, in real time or otherwise, the geographical position and the functioning or operation, including the speed, of a passenger transport vehicle and the registration number of such vehicle; "trackless train" means an articulated vehicle travelling on the road, other than a vehicle permanently running on rails, comprising a self-propelled vehicle with a maximum set speed which does not exceed 25 kilometers per hour and pulling one or more carriages connected by drawbar couplings; "trackless train route" means a route established and published by the Authority and which may be used by operators authorised to operate trackless trains in terms of regulation 68A;

"Tribunal" means the Administrative Review Tribunal established by article 5 of the Administrative Justice Act;

"two way communication system" means any wireless apparatus which is designed or adapted for the purpose of transmitting and receiving spoken messages; "type-approval certificate" shall have the same meaning as assigned to it in Regulation (EU) 2018/858; "undertaking" means any natural person, any legal person, whether profit-making or not, any association or group of persons without legal personality, whether profit-making or not, or any official body, whether having its own legal personality or being dependent upon an authority having such personality; "valid" shall be associated with any legitimate licence as issued by the competent authority, and to mean that such a licence is in effect and current for the period stated on the licence by virtue of the licence holder having met and continues to meet fully the obligations in accordance with these regulations; "vintage bus" means a passenger transport vehicle which has its engine compartment situated in front of its windscreen, and was -

(a) manufactured and registered in Malta as a motor route bus prior to the 1st January, 1960, and was registered as such for at least five consecutive years prior to the coming into force of these regulations, or

(b) manufactured prior to the 1st January, 1960 and registered in Malta as a motor vehicle for the carriage of passengers prior to the 1st January, 1992; and was so registered in Malta for at least five consecutive years prior to the coming into force of these regulations. Vehicles under paragraph (b) may only carry not more than 30 passengers; "week" means the period between the hours of 00:00 on Monday and 24.00 on the following Sunday; "weekly driving time" means the total accumulated driving time during a week; "weekly rest period" means the weekly period during which a driver may freely dispose of his time and covers a "regular weekly rest period" and a "reduced weekly rest period" as defined under these regulations; "working time" means:

(a) in the case of a mobile worker, the time from the beginning to the end of work, during which the mobile worker is at his workstation, at the disposal of the employer and exercising his functions or activities, being -

(i) the time devoted to road transport activities; and

(ii) the times during which the mobile worker cannot dispose freely of his time and is required to be at his workstation, ready to take up normal work, with certain tasks associated with being on duty, in particular during periods awaiting loading or unloading where their foreseeable duration is not known in advance, that is to say either before departure or just before the actual start of the period in question, or under collective agreements or any other agreement entered into between the employer and mobile workers employed by him in compliance with national legislation;

(b) in the case of a self-employed driver, the time from the beginning to the end of work, during which the self-employed driver is at his workstation, at the disposal of the client and exercising his functions or activities, being -

(i) the time devoted to road transport activities; and

(ii) the times during which the self-employed driver cannot dispose freely of his time and is required to be at his workstation, ready to take up normal work, with certain tasks associated with being on duty, in particular during periods awaiting loading or unloading where their foreseeable duration is not known in advance, that is to say either before departure or just before the actual start of the period in question, or under agreements between the social partners:

Provided that general administrative work that is not directly linked to the specific transport operation underway shall not be deemed to be working time; and "workstation" means -

(a) the location of the main place of business of the undertaking for which the person performing mobile road transport activities carries out duties, together with its various subsidiary places of business, regardless of whether they are located in the same place as its head office or main place of business,

(b) the passenger transport vehicle which the person performing mobile road transport activities uses when he carries out duties, or

(c) any other place in which activities connected with transportation are carried out.