Kay-Marie Fletch­er

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

As the saga of mo­tor ve­hi­cle fines con­tin­ues, the Cab­i­net yes­ter­day ap­proved a pro­pos­al for a new tick­et warn­ing sys­tem. Trans­port and Civ­il Avi­a­tion Min­is­ter Eli Za­k­our con­firmed that the sys­tem will be pre­sent­ed to Par­lia­ment in a few weeks.

Amid pub­lic out­cry over steep in­creas­es in mo­tor ve­hi­cle fines, Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­cent­ly an­nounced that a grace pe­ri­od will soon take ef­fect.

Yes­ter­day, Min­is­ter Za­k­our ex­plained the tick­et warn­ing sys­tem will in­clude a three or sev­en-day grace pe­ri­od for mo­torists to fix their ve­hi­cle de­fects or face the harsh penal­ties.

Dur­ing the first Cab­i­net me­dia brief­ing for 2026 held at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­ter, St Ann’s, yes­ter­day, Za­k­our said, “Cab­i­net to­day (Thurs­day) ap­proved pro­posed amend­ments to Sec­tions 80, 82, 88a and 88d of the Mo­tor Ve­hi­cles and Road Traf­fic Act 48:50 to in­tro­duce and im­ple­ment manda­to­ry fixed penal­ty warn­ings for spe­cif­ic traf­fic vi­o­la­tions in the 9th sched­ule, 18 in all … This will be go­ing to Par­lia­ment in the next com­ing weeks, and once it’s law, it will be manda­to­ry.”

He ex­plained that when it be­comes law, the two-part process will now in­volve vis­it­ing a po­lice sta­tion and up­load­ing your re­ceipt to an on­line por­tal, in­stead of the usu­al TTPost stop.

He said, “If you are stopped by a con­sta­ble, a TTPS of­fi­cer, li­cense of­fi­cer or a traf­fic war­den and there’s a de­fect on your ve­hi­cle, you will get a print­ed warn­ing. You have three or sev­en work­ing days to fix the de­fect. Once it’s fixed, you will go to any po­lice sta­tion or li­cense of­fice in the coun­try and present your­self and your ve­hi­cle. Once it’s con­firmed that the de­fect has been fixed, you will get a writ­ten re­ceipt that you will up­load to a por­tal, and the po­lice of­fi­cers as well will sub­mit that re­ceipt. It’s a two-tier sys­tem to a cen­tral unit, and the warn­ing will be can­celled. If you do not present your­self, the warn­ing au­to­mat­i­cal­ly be­comes a fixed penal­ty no­tice.”

Un­til such a time, mo­torists can still be served same-day fixed penal­ty tick­ets if stopped by po­lice or li­cense of­fi­cers on the na­tion’s roads.

Za­k­our con­tin­ued to im­plore mo­torists to en­sure their ve­hi­cles have no de­fects.

Guardian Me­dia has ob­served an in­crease in road­blocks and rou­tine in­spec­tions on the na­tion’s roads this week.

The min­is­ter was al­so un­apolo­getic about the penal­ty hike, say­ing the pre­vi­ous fines were no longer ef­fec­tive, de­fend­ing the need for the in­crease.

He added, “The pre­vi­ous fines lost their ef­fec­tive­ness. Per­sons were treat­ing these fixed no­tices as a mi­nor in­con­ve­nience and not a ma­jor con­se­quence … The on­ly per­sons who have to wor­ry are per­sons who break the law. Law-abid­ing cit­i­zens are noth­ing to fear. I make no apol­o­gy. This is our po­si­tion. We are do­ing this to en­sure com­pli­ance and save lives.”

He al­so promised that all li­cense of­fices will have up­dat­ed sig­nage by to­day so the pub­lic will be aware of all the price ad­just­ments.

Asked if he be­lieves the hike in penal­ties will lead to an in­crease in crime, he said no.

As for con­cerns over the con­duct of traf­fic war­dens and li­cens­ing of­fi­cers pos­si­bly abus­ing their au­thor­i­ty when is­su­ing tick­ets, the min­is­ter said he will be meet­ing with them.

He al­so crit­i­cised the for­mer ad­min­is­tra­tion’s de­mer­it point sys­tem, which he said did not work.

OF­FENCES UN­DER THE NEW TICK­ET WARN­ING SYS­TEM

* No iden­ti­fi­ca­tion lights for the il­lu­mi­na­tion of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion marks on ve­hi­cles at night-3 work­ing days

* Num­ber of pas­sen­gers to be car­ried not print­ed on the right hand side of the door of a taxi-3 work­ing days

* No tare and MGW paint­ed on ve­hi­cles-3 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with de­fec­tive fit­tings (eg, wind­screen)-7 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with­out si­lencers or fit­ted with cut outs-3 work­ing days

* Unau­tho­rised lights to front or rear of ve­hi­cles-3 work­ing days

* Unau­tho­rised let­ters or fig­ures on ve­hi­cles-3 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cles with­out two head lamps-3 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with­out park lights-3 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with­out tail lights-3 work­ing days

* No left-hand dri­ve no­tice af­fixed to ap­pro­pri­ate ve­hi­cle-3 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with­out horn-3 work­ing days

* Per­mit­ting ex­cess sparks, smoke or vis­i­ble vapour-7 work­ing days

* Ve­hi­cle with­out re­flect­ing mir­ror-3 work­ing days

* Use of a noisy ve­hi­cle-7 work­ing days

* Use of ve­hi­cle with no wind­screen wipers or de­fec­tive wipers-3 work­ing days

* Pub­lic Ser­vice ve­hi­cles with­out spare tyre-3 work­ing days

* Plac­ing of ad­ver­tise­ments on the side of a win­dow of a taxi-3 work­ing days