The accession of Croatia to the European Union marked the beginning of a new period in the work of the Road Traffic Inspectorate of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs, Transport and Infrastructure. A large number of regulations and directives of the European Commission and Parliament, and the new internal legislation of the Republic of Croatian which thereby entered into force set new challenges for all inspection officers: for the leadership in terms of staff training and the professional public, participation in public debates and expert meetings, and cooperation with other competent authorities; and for inspectors in terms of acquiring and implementing new knowledge and skills, and introducing new monitoring procedures.
The paper explores and describes the pertinent experience to date. It describes the activities of the Road Traffic Inspection within a twinning project, membership in ECR and CORTE, activities in terms of the educational and repressive role of the inspection within the transport industry, but also the problems faced by road transport inspectors in Croatia in their work. The paper also provides a comparison of experiences of the Road Traffic Inspection of the Republic of Croatia and those of the neighbouring EU countries (Slovenia, Hungary) in the process of adjustment to EU standards in the implementation of the monitoring of road transport services. The entire research is based on the current road transport legal regulation that pertains primarily to the so-called social legislation in road transport and to the legislation regulating road transport of goods and passengers.
