Nothing But a Tax Grab

Obviously, penalizing drivers - or car owners - by forcing them to pay in dollars for breaking the rules was not intended originally to squeeze money out of people in order to swell government coffers.

But where are we at these days, in terms of administration?  

One would expect that the money paid by miscreants for their malfeasance (hey that was pretty good, eh?) would be put toward things like traffic enforcement (cops have a cost, whatever they're doing) or highway improvement, driver education, etc; things that would advance safety.

So, someone tell me - where does the money go?  Toward safety initiatives - or government funding?

We have a penalty point system in place here in BC, it's been in place for years.  Take a look at MVA(R) Division 28 for details.  (As an aside, if you're ever trying to find this or that in the Motor Vehicle Act - which is very poorly indexed - Div. 28 is a great place to use as a reference for the section you're after.)  The whole idea behind a penalty/demerit point system is that - regardless of how wealthy you are - if you continually break the rules, your driving privileges will be revoked for a finite period.  That way, the most dangerous drivers are removed from the road (so that the rest of us are protected from them) and forced to experience the inconvenience of being unable to legally drive.

Incidentally, but relevantly I think, 14,000 drivers were ticketed in 2014 for driving without a license.  And that doesn't just mean they left it at home, it means they were no longer licensed to drive, or possibly never were in the first place.

But for years now, police have been making their own lives easier by adopting a stance, following collisions, of not blaming anybody.  No tickets.  No point penalties.  They will say 'ICBC will deal with this' as their excuse for not allocating blame to the driver most at fault, when in fact they're just doing their best to avoid having to go to court and defend their policing actions; quite understandable, as they have nothing to gain from it and valuable time to lose doing so.  But this inaction on the part of police does NOTHING toward eliminating bad drivers from continuing to drive badly.

Ever wonder why ICBC keeps increasing our insurance rates, even when we accumulate zillions of kilometers of accident free driving?  It's to cover their costs, and then some; the 'some' usually gets skimmed off the top, and transferred to the government's coffers.

But don't anybody go calling this a tax grab!

Have faith that your elected government, ICBC, and the police forces out there, are actually doing all that they can to keep us all safe from dangerous drivers.  I mean, that's why we put them in power, isn't it?

As every case have to be examined on its merits - some situations are safety policing, while others are a blatant money/ticket/activity grab.

When a bunch of Occifers gather up at the bottom of a hill on the highway, just past the unreasonable 80 sign, plucking random motorists out of a crowd of 100km/h+ traffic on a sunny day - its one thing.

When a courteous Police member is monitoring a residential 4 way stop high crash intersection in the rain after dark - issuing tickets and warnings for the incorrect stops - thats a whole different case.

Regardless of where the money goes, I believe that the monetary penalties, or rather the consequences thereof in light of the majority's living situation are the main reason that 14 THOUSAND drivers were ticketed for driving unlicensed in 2014.

As far as the cant-do-the-time-dont-do-the-crime sentiment goes, it is infuriating that anybody would put that nonsense on the discussion table; since considering that a typical driver commits a ticketable offence every 3 city blocks on average, the potential for the money grab is enormous.

People's collective driving habits and rule books co-exist in parallel realities - just see what the Google Autonomous Car engineers have to say about it. They are on the forefront of the inquiry into the duplicitous nature of how people drive and how they should be driving. There is simply a ton of money in the divide of proper and expedient that it seems, at-least from one perspective, that this can be treated as an odd "savings account" for the municipalities. Perhaps municipalities/police enforce only 3% of ticketable offences now, but with a simple order they could be out in full force - raising revenue like never before.

Will that increased enforcement order come on the tail of the increased safety concerns or will it be in-connection with the budgets being covered in red ink - only time will tell.

From the things that we publicly know, facts that have happened: certain jurisdictions in the USA have ramped up enforcement as the municipal budgets dwindled in the recession - with fine enforcement, penalties for missed payments, fines for non-payment and extortionary settlement tactics being rolled out in full force to prop up the sinking municipal budgets when all other sources of revenue have failed.

If its not a tax grab now - it certainly has all the potential of being one in the future.

I believe that monetary penalties should be completely phased out of safety enforcement as far as the driving is concerned. And that the scene from the 5th element - where an on-board computer monitors and subtracts available points from a license inserted into the terminal is a much more safety conscious system; but I am uncertain that it really is required in order to make everyone drive safer.

Since engineering advancements have taken the biggest toll out of the road-toll, perhaps the focus should yet again be with car manufactures to a) prevent tailgating, b) prevent distracted driving, c) prevent rolling stops/crosswalk accidents all via machine methods - taking the driver out of the equation completely.

In response to "DriveSmartBC"s comments....

We have judicial procedures in Canada for a reason.  It isn't supposed to be legal to meet out justice without proper procedures even when people are found committing serious offenses.

Our society has.... sorry, had, decided that for all offenses there should be checks and balances before someone is convicted of a crime.  That was until the BC Liberal party got some "bright" ideas.

"Drive sober and it won't happen", I would say is the same as "Don't drive while impaired, or over the legal limit".

So the grandfather who was intoxicated BUT was a passenger in his own car, being driving by his grandson, who had had absolutely nothing to drink ?  He was victimized by the system that allowed an RCMP officer who had no clue of the law or how to interpret the law and as a result lost his driver's license and vehicle wrongly.

The reliability (or lack of) of breath testing instruments has nothing to do with the IRP.  The IRP was created to cut legal corners, to allow police to be crown witness, crown prosecutor and judge all at the side of the road.

The "fail safe" is also a joke.  A person found guilty at the curb can then appeal his/her roadside conviction to a non-judge administrator, and do so only by being required to comply to rules that make a joke out of the Charter of Rights.

Oh, that's right it's not an "offense", it's just a "administrative sanction".   You can call it anything you like, it's still wrong.

and, yes it works to some degree.  So would linching drinking drivers from the nearest tree.

Let's say the testing was 100% accurate, to get that evidence in front of a court of law to convict a person of criminal drinking and driving (Impaired or over 08) would require reports and the documentation of evidence, that would take TIME, and hey when the fish are biting you don't stop to clean each one.

BUT (the biggie that nobody picks up on) the rule was that the IRP was only going to be used for non-collision events.  Because if a driver is not charged with a criminal offence their liability insurance will still cover them.  And except for hit and run if a driver is not charged criminally they even get their own car fixed at ICBC's expense.

It's happening all the time.

And the ignorant masses we call the public what do they say "well I don't care I don't drink and drive, so it won't affect me"

Tell that to grandpa, the passenger.

Many rental cars in Florida - maybe elsewhere too have a GPS set up onboard their cars. Much like an aviation black box which shows where you went and how fast you were driving. Some companies analyze these stats and in some cases show that the driver was speeding, they fine the driver! How or why they can do it is unknown. To be frank I heard of this 20 years ago when I lived in that state.

What we need are more police on the roads doing their jobs. We have a detachment here that has only 3 officers on per shift. And 2 might be in the office doing paperwork.

it's a Sunday afternoon. I spent the morning working on my car and then I took it around the block for a test run. In that 15 minute stretch I saw one car run a stop sign and two others run 4 way stops at separate interesections. Three tickets there may have taught these persons a lesson. But probably not!

Maybe if these offenders got tickets they might also scream Tax Grab.