Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

The T&T Po­lice Ser­vice, Ar­rive Alive and mem­bers of the pub­lic are all sup­port­ing the Gov­ern­ment’s in­crease in fines for road traf­fic of­fences, say­ing it sends a strong mes­sage against ir­re­spon­si­ble and reck­less dri­ving.

Dur­ing his Bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion in Par­lia­ment on Mon­day, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dave Tan­coo an­nounced that fines for dri­ving un­der the in­flu­ence (DUI) will move from $12,000 to $15,000, dri­ving while dis­qual­i­fied will in­crease from $1,500 to $5,000, and care­less dri­ving will climb from $1,000 to $15,000.

How­ev­er, Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, while in op­po­si­tion, had crit­i­cised the then Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment ad­min­is­tra­tion for en­forc­ing harsh fines for traf­fic of­fences, say­ing they were rev­enue-dri­ven rather than fo­cused on road safe­ty.

But co­or­di­na­tor of the TTPS Strate­gic Road Safe­ty Project, Sgt Brent Bat­son, said the TTPS was in sup­port of any leg­isla­tive ef­fort aimed at mak­ing the na­tion’s roads safer.

“The TTPS wel­comes any leg­isla­tive sup­port that is geared to­wards mak­ing the road­ways safer. In­creas­es in fines as­so­ci­at­ed with the com­mis­sion of road traf­fic of­fences are one of the strate­gies in which the State is send­ing a mes­sage that cer­tain dri­ver be­hav­iours which present un­nec­es­sary risk to the lives and wel­fare of road users will not be tol­er­at­ed.”  

Not­ing that al­co­hol-im­paired dri­ving con­tin­ues to play a part in poor de­ci­sion-mak­ing, which con­tributes to road traf­fic col­li­sions in­volv­ing se­ri­ous or fa­tal in­juries, Bat­son re­mind­ed the pub­lic that de­mer­it points still re­main in ef­fect for the traf­fic of­fences of DUI, which car­ries a nine-point penal­ty—six for care­less dri­ving and 14 for dri­ving while dis­qual­i­fied.

He added that the TTPS con­tin­ues to en­gage the pub­lic with road safe­ty out­reach pro­grammes un­der the TTPS iRoad­safe Cam­paign and Be­yond the Tape, as well as ed­u­ca­tion­al part­ner­ships with key stake­hold­ers such as the Min­istry of Trans­port and Civ­il Avi­a­tion, Li­cens­ing Di­vi­sion, and Ar­rive Alive.

He said the TTPS not­ed that when paired with con­sis­tent en­force­ment, the new fines are ex­pect­ed to make dri­vers think twice be­fore en­gag­ing in dan­ger­ous be­hav­iour.

Ar­rive Alive pres­i­dent Sharon In­gle­field said the NGO sup­ports the tougher fines but wants to see de­mer­it points re­in­stat­ed for some traf­fic of­fences.  

Fol­low­ing pub­lic out­cry over the de­mer­it sys­tem, the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress Gov­ern­ment re­moved some of the of­fences.

How­ev­er, she said, “Ar­rive Alive is sug­gest­ing the re­in­state­ment of de­mer­it points for ex­ces­sive speed and seat­belts, which are ma­jor of­fences that cause se­ri­ous col­li­sions. 

“Cer­tain­ly, fines and de­mer­it points are an ef­fec­tive way to be proac­tive on our na­tion’s roads with re­gard to law en­force­ment. Law en­force­ment, cou­pled with ed­u­ca­tion, will re­duce the num­ber of col­li­sions on our roads.”

In­gle­field al­so praised the Gov­ern­ment for look­ing in­to en­forc­ing the law to com­pen­sate vic­tims of unin­sured dri­vers. 

“We look for­ward to the en­act­ment of that law ur­gent­ly, as well as the op­er­a­tional­i­sa­tion of the fund to pay out those vic­tims who have suf­fered in­juries, as well as fam­i­lies who have suf­fered from the loss of bread­win­ners due to reck­less dri­ving on our na­tion’s roads.”

In­gle­field al­so re­quest­ed reg­u­lar meet­ings be­tween the Na­tion­al Road Safe­ty Coun­cil and stake­hold­ers, in­clud­ing the po­lice, util­i­ty com­pa­nies, re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions, and min­istry of­fi­cials.

Guardian Me­dia al­so spoke to sev­er­al mem­bers of the pub­lic in San Fer­nan­do about the in­crease in fines.

Kevin Allen said the mea­sure would serve as a de­ter­rent to drunk dri­ving, which he blamed for sev­er­al fa­tal crash­es on the roads.

An­oth­er pedes­tri­an, Gary Hodge, said, “It is ex­cel­lent be­cause it would save lives.”