ANM-TVDE Proposes Public-Service-Transport Recognition Inside the Lei 45/2018 Revision — Association Wants Equal-Dignity Clause With Taxis as PSD Counters With Taxis Operating Through TVDE Platforms

The Associação Nacional Movimento TVDE (ANM-TVDE, National TVDE Movement Association) sent a formal proposal on Friday 6 June 2026 to every party with parliamentary representation, asking that the Transporte Individual e Remunerado de Passageiros em Veículos Descaracterizados (TVDE, Individual and Remunerated Passenger Transport in Unmarked Vehicles) sector be recognised as a serviço público de transporte de passageiros (public passenger-transport service) on the same footing as the táxi sector. The submission lands in the middle of the Assembleia da República's especialidade phase debate on amendments to Lei n.º 45/2018 of 10 August — the foundational TVDE statute now seven years old and undergoing its most consequential revision since enactment.

The association's headline ask is symmetry. It wants the new text to assure "o setor TVDE seja reconhecido como serviço de transporte público de passageiros, em igualdade de dignidade e relevância para a mobilidade nacional relativamente ao setor do táxi" (the TVDE sector recognised as a public passenger-transport service, with equal dignity and relevance for national mobility relative to the taxi sector). The framing matters because public-service status drives downstream effects across tax, licensing, public-procurement participation and access to municipal mobility programmes that have historically been reserved for táxi operators. The association is explicit that it wants "a eliminação das atuais desigualdades entre os setores TVDE e táxi" (the elimination of current inequalities between the TVDE and taxi sectors), without spelling out which specific carve-outs it is targeting.

ANM-TVDE president Victor Soares anchored the submission with a market-significance pitch: "o setor TVDE desempenha hoje um papel essencial na mobilidade nacional, assegurando diariamente o transporte de milhões de passageiros através de plataformas digitais disponíveis 24 horas por dia" (the TVDE sector plays an essential role in national mobility today, ensuring the daily transport of millions of passengers through digital platforms available 24 hours a day). "A legislação deve acompanhar esta realidade e reconhecer a importância estratégica do setor para o país" (Legislation should accompany this reality and recognise the sector's strategic importance for the country), Soares argued in the communiqué.

The numbers behind the ask are recorded on the Instituto da Mobilidade e dos Transportes (IMT, Institute for Mobility and Transport) data platform launched in collaboration with Uber and Bolt. The March 2026 read — the most recent published — shows 39,615 active certified TVDE drivers, up roughly 6% from 37,495 in March 2025; 14,649 active operators, up around 23% year on year; and a hybrid or fully electric share of the active fleet at nearly 50%, against 33% twelve months earlier. Inconformity flagged by the IMT platform sits at 0.43%, down from 7.92% when the data hub went live in March 2025. By nationality, 51% of certified drivers are Portuguese, 21% Brazilian and 11% Indian. The Autoridade da Mobilidade e dos Transportes (AMT, Mobility and Transport Authority) Annual Report tape we have referenced previously priced 2025 TVDE platform revenue at €808 million, up 36% on 2024.

The association's submission also positions itself against a parallel PSD proposal currently being debated in the same especialidade window. The PSD draft would permit taxis to operate through TVDE digital platforms — a tech-neutral mobility-platform vision. ANM-TVDE says that opening reinforces its own demand: "a recente proposta apresentada pelo PSD, que prevê a possibilidade de os táxis operarem através das plataformas TVDE, reforça a necessidade de garantir regras equilibradas para todos os profissionais que prestam serviços através das mesmas plataformas digitais" (the recent PSD proposal, which provides for the possibility of taxis operating through TVDE platforms, reinforces the need to ensure balanced rules for all professionals who provide services through the same digital platforms). The association went further and indicated openness for the reverse flow — "que os operadores TVDE possam prestar serviço através de aplicações atualmente utilizadas pelo setor do táxi" (that TVDE operators may provide service through applications currently used by the taxi sector), in exchange for the dignity parity.

The political context for the request is tense. TVDE drivers held a Wednesday 29 April protest in Lisbon — roughly a hundred drivers in a convoy that ran from Campo Pequeno to the Uber and Bolt headquarters demanding tariff floors and rejecting the inclusion of taxis inside the regime. An earlier Tuesday 21 January app blackout — a one-day platform-off action — sought the same outcome. The Câmara Municipal de Lisboa (CML, Lisbon City Council) created reserved zones in the most-touristed areas of the capital on 26 March 2026 where TVDE platforms cannot pick up — a separate municipal regulatory layer that the law revision will not directly touch but which sets the political mood. And on 16 April, a wave of TVDE drivers were forced to pause activity after their autorizações de residência (residence authorisations) had lapsed in the AIMA backlog, a downstream consequence of the broader immigration pipeline crisis covered in our recent reporting.

The Conselho de Ministros approved the Government's TVDE-law revision proposal at the start of the year, sending Proposta de Lei n.º 7/XVII to the Assembleia for generalidade approval. The current especialidade work in the Comissão de Economia, Obras Públicas, Planeamento e Habitação focuses on tariff floors, vehicle quality criteria, residence-authorisation requirements for non-EU drivers, platform commission caps, and a clarified safety and oversight regime. ANM-TVDE's public-service-status amendment is a horizontal change that, if accepted, would re-cascade across the entire text — and would force a renegotiation of the platform-commission and tariff sections, since public-service operators sit inside a different fiscal and contractual frame than private commercial transport providers.

The Assembleia is expected to close the especialidade phase before the parliamentary recess opens in mid-July, with final votação prevista for the closing plenary week. Whether ANM-TVDE's amendment finds a parliamentary sponsor — Chega has historically been the closest to TVDE demands, the PSD is committed to its tech-neutral framing, the PS is balancing táxi-union pressure, and the Bloco/PCP/Livre block has prioritised driver labour protections — will determine whether the public-service-status clause survives to the final draft or dies in committee.

What This Means for Expats and Residents

• Tariff predictability is the biggest unknown: If public-service status is granted, expect the Government to gain power to set tariff floors and ceilings for TVDE platforms — likely shrinking the surge-pricing volatility frequent users currently see during Sunday-night airport runs or peak event evenings in Lisbon. The exact mechanism would land in implementing regulation, not in the primary law.
• Receipts and IRS impact for frequent users: Public-service classification typically pulls a tighter receipt regime, with stronger Autoridade Tributária (AT) traceability of trip-by-trip fares — potentially easier to claim deductible kilometres for atividade independente recibos-verdes professionals.
• Driver-side residence permits remain the binding constraint: The 16 April AIMA-backlog forced pauses for non-EU drivers will continue regardless of the law revision. If you depend on Uber and Bolt for transport in Lisbon or Porto, expect occasional supply contractions tied to residence-permit renewal cycles, not to any law-revision outcome on 11 July.
• Watch the Lisbon no-pick-up zones separately: The CML reserved zones in Baixa, Chiado and Príncipe Real announced on 26 March 2026 are a municipal regulation, not a national-law issue. Whatever the Assembleia votes, those Lisbon-specific lift-zone rules stand until the CML changes its own deliberation.
• Service-mix shift is the medium-term story: With hybrid and electric vehicles already 50% of the active TVDE fleet (up from 33% a year ago), and if public-service status follows, expect public-procurement pipelines for municipal mobility contracts — paratransit, elder-mobility, school routes in low-density municípios — to start opening to TVDE-classified platforms. This is a 2027-2028 horizon, not 2026.

The ANM-TVDE communiqué circulated to all parliamentary parties as the especialidade phase debate continues at the Comissão de Economia, Obras Públicas, Planeamento e Habitação. The press wire is carried by Lusa (Agência Lusa) and we will return to the question when committee mark-up of the relevant articles concludes and when the IMT publishes its next quarterly active-driver, active-operator and inconformity tape.