Traffic ticket distress
The Government and some taxi operators appear to be on a collision course as misunderstanding grows over the issue of outstanding traffic tickets and the deadline given for the related fines to be paid.
According to the head of one entity that represents taxi drivers, some members — under the impression that they would be given a special arrangement to pay outstanding tickets — went to the courts to make payments but have been met with higher fines, their licences suspended, and have been ushered to lock-up for various traffic violations.
“We were given a six for a nine to appease society that we are bad guys and we are not getting any payment [plan],” Transport Operators Development Sustainable Services President Egeton Newman told the Jamaica Observer on Friday.
“We encouraged all our members to go out in full force to ensure that they deal with their traffic ticket and when they go there… their licences were taken away because they have incurred demerit points. At least two guys I know [have] gone to spend 30 days behind bars and it’s much more than that… 11 licences were taken away yesterday in courts within the Kingston Metropolitan Region,” he said.
Newman said the problem is that the cabbies were of the view that the Government made a promise that if outstanding tickets were settled, demerit points would not be incurred on licences. However, they have seen the opposite.
“[It seems] there was no communication between the Cabinet and the chief justice or the courts administration, and the courts say it’s business as usual because they received no official communiqué from Cabinet as to the way forward,” he said, noting that cabbies are uncertain about the Government’s position on the matter.
Under law, the Cabinet has no authority to instruct the courts on any matter, and that point has been made by Government ministers who point out that any such attempt would be a breach of the constitution.
On Tuesday, the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) issued a release stating that after wide-ranging deliberations and consultations with various government agencies and departments in relation to the implementation of the new Road Traffic Act (RTA) in February 2023, the Cabinet gave instructions as it relates to the implementation of the new legislation and the launch of a new traffic ticket management system.
“Cabinet, being cognisant of the overwhelming public demand for the effective implementation of the Road Traffic Act 2018, and a transparent and accountable traffic ticket management system, decided that legislative steps will be taken to render all demerit points and tickets accrued up to February 1, 2018 null, and as such they will not be transitioned to the RTA 2018,” OPM said.
“Provided that the tickets accrued after February 1, 2018 are paid before February 1, 2023, demerit points will be expunged upon the implementation of the RTA 2018, [and] Cabinet wishes to advise the public that, as of February 1, 2023, with the new RTA and the new traffic ticket management system, there will be greater efficiency with a fully digitised process,” added OPM.
On Friday, minister without portfolio in the Office of the Prime Minister Floyd Green insisted that the Government’s position has not changed, and pointed to an OPM press release on Thursday quoting Prime Minister Andrew Holness as saying “no general amnesty has been declared and no special provisions have been made to facilitate any particular group”.
According to Green, “All tickets that are issued come with a time frame within which people can pay and they do not have to face the court once they pay within that time frame. So all the tickets that have been issued, persons could have gone and dealt with them. There was nothing stopping them being dealt with. So the fact that a ticket is outstanding means that the person got the ticket and did not go to the tax office to pay the ticket before the expiry of 21 days.
“Oftentimes what is happening is that people did not pay the ticket, they have not gone to court, and as such their tickets are outstanding. So the only way those tickets can be dealt with is to go to the court and to face the judge.”
Earlier this week, Justice Minister Delroy Chuck had dispelled claims by some players in the public transport sector that their demand for an amnesty had been granted and their call for an extended period to pay outstanding fines also approved.
Chuck insisted that “every single traffic violator who has incurred a penalty will have to pay the penalty”, noting that if they fail to do so, all the consequences of the present RTA, and those that will come under the new Act, will come into play.
“If the motorists with outstanding traffic tickets fail to pay by January 31st, 2023, then, on the 1st of February, not only will warrants be enforced, but those motorists will not be able to renew their driver’s licence and the vehicle that they were using cannot have its licence renewed. So it’s totally inappropriate to call it an amnesty,” Chuck told the Observer.
According to Chuck, calls from operators of public passenger vehicles for up to six months to pay outstanding tickets were also ignored by the Government.
“We are not going to back down, and everyone who violated the road code must pay up, and they have 40-plus days to do so,” declared Chuck as he noted that, unlike under amnesties in the past where the outstanding fines could be paid at tax offices, motorists will have to go before the courts this time around to pay their fines.
“We are not so interested in the money. We are more interested in law and order on the roads. We need to stop the chaos and the carnage on the nation’s streets,” added Chuck.
On Friday, however, Newman suggested that he and his colleagues were still not clear on the matter.
“We are saying to the Government, we need to know the position. Will you be communicating with the court administration? Did we get a payment plan, did we get an amnesty? What did we get? Why did you come back with a press release to say ‘Yes, everything was in place to get a payment arrangement?’ We did not get anything because we were happy to know, as the release said, that this would not affect our demerit points. The Government is now charging us two, three times the amount of money, and in the same breath taking away our licences,” he said.
“We are giving the Government until Tuesday to address the problem, tell us exactly what is the position or else…” he said.