New traffic law may not rein in road hogs
THE EDITOR, Sir:
THE FIGURES for road deaths continue to cause concern. They are the result of a multifaceted problem. Widespread indiscipline manifests itself in the use of the roads, as well as elsewhere. This cannot be separated from our failure to enforce laws already on the books.
Is it that we’re trying to police on the cheap? I wonder, as taxis, in particular, are not even hiding when they break the road traffic laws. At every major intersection, the filter lane is their right of way to the front of the line. I have seen them, and motorcyclists, go straight through red lights.
We have all seen them turn two-lane roads into three lanes as they bore in and out of traffic. We have traffic police, traffic courts, and the Transport Authority. How can these things be happening with such impunity?
I fear for the new law in which so much hope is reposed. Will resources and the will to enforce it be found? Or will it fall victim to the malady that afflicts the present law? Enforcement goes beyond catching the lawbreaker, which we seem to have great difficulty doing. It also affects what happens after.
Issuing tickets has been an enormous waste of paper, as, again, there is no enforcement. Hard-core offenders simply ignore tickets, secure in the knowledge that NOTHING is gong to happen. There are drivers on our roads with dozens, if not hundreds, of tickets outstanding, and they’re not in hiding.
There are people of goodwill labouring against enormous odds to bring order to our roads. I have had conversations with some of them, and I understand the odds they face in their efforts.
ENFORCEMENT
My concern is that without an effective enforcement mechanism, which I see little evidence of, this Road Traffic Act will simply continue to victimise the law-abiding citizen who has fallen afoul of some capricious or outright silly provision therein. The hard-core lawbreaker will continue to pay scant attention to tickets, because he can neither be caught nor punished.
Policing on the cheap will not work in Jamaica. We either provide for effective enforcement of our laws, or continue with the apartheid system that punishes those who come forward and is unable to detect or sanction those who don’t.