Onus on drivers over traffic fines
From The West Australian
By Ben Spencer
December 21, 2005
Long-awaited traffic
fine owner-onus laws will finally come into effect on January 1, more
than five years after they were passed through State Parliament.
Under the changes
to road safety laws to be announced by Police Minister Michelle Roberts
today, vehicle owners will be made liable for traffic fines if they
do not report the driver.
Delays in the owner-onus
legislation, which the Gallop Government passed through Parliarment
in 2000 but has never been proclaimed in the Government Gazette to
allow enforcement, have cost the State millions of dollars in revenue
by letting thousands of motorists flout road safety laws.
The Government
had claimed the laws could not be proclaimed without Capspeed project
- a $7 million upgrade of the fines management system that also enables
improved drivers recognition.
Mrs Roberts said
she had decided to push ahead with the owner-onus laws despite police
saying Capspeed would not be operating until the middle of next year.
WA Police had to write off $2.15 million in 2004 for motorists who
slipped through the loophole. Motorcyclists have escaped about $14
million in fines since 2000.
Mrs Roberts said
under the new laws the owner of a licensed vehicle would be deemed
to the "person responsible" for the vehicle.
"If the vehicle
is detected by a speed camera or by a camera at traffic lights, the
owner will have to pay a fine unless they can identify who was driving
the vehicle at the time," she said.
