Jensen La Vende

Se­nior Re­porter

jensen.lavende@guardian.co.tt

When Par­lia­ment re­sumes, it is hoped that the in­com­ing gov­ern­ment will pass leg­is­la­tion so that dri­vers’ li­cences are not sus­pend­ed when too many de­mer­it points are ac­cu­mu­lat­ed. In­stead, er­rant dri­vers will have to pass a re­fresh­er course to be able to op­er­ate a ve­hi­cle once more.

Speak­ing at the launch of the on­line dri­ver’s li­cence per­mit re­new­al and cer­ti­fied copy re­new­al sys­tem at the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port Head Of­fice, Min­is­ter of Works and Trans­port Ro­han Sinanan said Cab­i­net had al­ready ap­proved the new sys­tem, which will need par­lia­men­tary ap­proval.

“There have been some com­plaints or ob­ser­va­tions about the de­mer­it point sys­tem, that it’s been a bit too harsh. The min­istry has con­stant­ly been re­view­ing that. In 2022 we re­viewed it, in 2024, and a fur­ther re­view was done and has been ap­proved by Cab­i­net, where we are look­ing at not dis­qual­i­fy­ing you when you reach a cer­tain thresh­old.”

Ac­cord­ing to the Mo­tor Ve­hi­cles and Road Traf­fic Act, any­one who ac­cu­mu­lates ten to 14 points with­in three years will be dis­qual­i­fied from hold­ing or ob­tain­ing a li­cence for six months. Any­one with 14 to 20 points can be dis­qual­i­fied from hold­ing or ob­tain­ing a li­cence for one year, and above 20 points is barred from hold­ing or ob­tain­ing a li­cence for two years.

Sinanan said had Par­lia­ment not been dis­solved, it would have been brought for leg­isla­tive ap­proval, which would re­quire a sim­ple ma­jor­i­ty. He said once the er­rant dri­ver com­plet­ed the “sim­ple re­fresh­er course,” the points would be re­moved from their li­cences and they would be back to a clean slate.

He said the pur­pose of the de­mer­it point sys­tem was not to pe­nalise dri­vers and earn rev­enue but to change the cul­ture of way­ward dri­ving. He al­so spoke of plans to change all the bus­es with­in the Pub­lic Trans­port Ser­vice Cor­po­ra­tion fleet to elec­tric bus­es, which is part of the new Road Traf­fic Pol­i­cy.

Ad­dress­ing the new on­line sys­tem, Trans­port Com­mis­sion­er Clive Clarke said soon, dri­ver’s li­cences will be re­newed on­line and cer­ti­fied copies re­quest­ed and mailed.

Clarke said the in-house project took ten months to com­plete at a cost of $250,000.

Some dri­vers, such as taxi dri­vers, goods de­liv­ery dri­vers and first-timers, will still have to vis­it the near­est li­cens­ing of­fices to com­plete their trans­ac­tions, as well as all dri­vers who need their ve­hi­cles in­spect­ed be­cause of changes to the ve­hi­cle colour, en­gine and oth­er no­tice­able changes.