Fortunately, this news reached us the day before this issue of BOOTE went to press. If the ministerial decision had been made just one day later, we would have confronted you, dear readers, with a report
would have confronted you, dear readers, with a report whose content has not been valid since 5 February: Katharina Reiche, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Transport, had announced in mid-November last year that there would be a toll for recreational craft from August 2018.
Since 5 February, however, the State Secretary's announcements have fortunately been "water under the bridge", as the planned boat toll was personally "cashed in" by Minister Dobrindt on that day.
In response to the question "Is the leisure boat toll coming?", the Minister told the Lübecker Nachrichten newspaper: "No. I am aware of the discussion, but I have no plans for a vignette for pleasure craft." He continued: "Rumours about a toll do not correspond to my ideas. The truth is that we are currently working on a water tourism concept that will be presented this year. A vignette for pleasure craft is not planned."
The minister's change of heart regarding the recreational craft toll is both pleasing and astonishing. After all, it was not only State Secretary Reiche who publicised the Ministry's plans for the toll in November last year. However, she was the first to cause a stir in the media with her announcements on the recreational craft toll.
In fact, on 8 April 2014, the Federal Ministry of Transport (BMVI) hosted a round of talks with water sports associations in Hamburg on the topic of "Federal Fees Act and Recreational Craft Flat Rate".
The German Sailing Association published the results of this meeting - largely unnoticed by the public - on its website on 10 April 2014: "Federal waterways will be subject to charges," it said. It continued: "The Federal Fees Act (BGebG), which was passed by the last German Bundestag, requires "that from 2017 at the latest, fees are to be charged for individually attributable federal services in accordance with the full cost principle. This also expressly applies to the possibility of utilising federal waterways."
The fee is generally charged according to the costs attributable to the individual users or user groups. The BMVI put the costs incurred by the federal government for sport and leisure shipping at around 65 million euros per year.
The "full cost principle" stipulated by the BGebG could be restricted "insofar as there is a corresponding public interest and principles of equity to the contrary." From this perspective, the BMVI stated at the time, water sports, leisure boating and water tourism should not be made impossible by user financing. At the same time, however, user financing should cover a "significant proportion" of the costs of 65 million euros.
That sounds like the famous "squaring of the circle". For example, speculation was rife as to whether the €10 per metre boat length that was being discussed at the time for the boat toll - or for a vignette - would actually cover a "significant proportion" of the costs.
It was probably precisely these considerations that prompted Minister Dobrindt to pull the ripcord. "The costs and benefits of a boat toll are not in any reasonable proportion," a spokesperson for the ministry told us. For this reason, the toll plans would not be pursued further, neither within the framework of the Federal Fees Act nor within the framework of the water tourism concept to be presented this year.
According to the motto "Every ten years again", Minister Dobrindt is following a good tradition with his withdrawal from the boat toll: in 2004/05, it was Transport Minister Stolpe who was shipwrecked with the introduction of a "vignette for motor and sailing yachts of 60 to 90 euros per year". At the beginning of the 1990s, Finance Minister Theo Waigel failed to introduce a boat tax after massive protests. When asked by BOOTE whether there would be a new attempt at a boat tax in the foreseeable future, a spokesperson for the ministry said: "Certainly not in this legislative period and under Minister Dobrindt."
The withdrawal from the current toll plans has generally caused great relief among the water sports associations. Philipp Süß, Secretary General of the German Sailing Association, said: "This is an important signal. It strengthens the optimism of thousands of water sports clubs, companies and tourism providers throughout Germany to further develop Germany as a country of water sports."
Steffen Häbich, Head of ADAC Sportschifffahrt, hopes that Minister Do-brindt's decision "will allow a coherent water tourism concept to be presented that is sustainable and financially secure in the long term, beyond the failed financing by users." Häbich's main focus is on securing the continued existence of around 2,800 kilometres of waterways that have been downgraded by the federal government to "other waterways", which are only of minor importance for commercial shipping but are very important for recreational shipping.
Incidentally, the financial contribution of recreational boating to the maintenance costs of the waterways is by no means zero. Only last year, the annual lump sum to be paid to the federal government by the German Motor Yacht Association and the German Sailing Association was increased from 50,000 to 77,000 euros.
