‘Aarto too complex to succeed’

With more than 2000 offences carrying demerit points, the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences (Aarto) Act is over-designed and too complex. According to Professor Jackie Walters, head of the department of transport and supply chain management at the University of Johannesburg, while a demerit point system will go a long way to changing driver behaviour, government should try to decrease the number of offences carrying demerit points drastically while implementing a fine system as penalisation for the majority of the offences. Gavin Kelly of the Road Freight Association agreed saying if the list could be decreased to some 50 demeritcarrying offences it would go a long way to being implemented more easily and having more effect. Walters, speaking on behalf of the South African Bus Operators’ Association (Saboa), said the success of Aarto depended on its enforceability as well as the resources dedicated to the system. “If one looks at countries where the system has been introduced effectively – like the UK, New Zealand, Canada and Australia – you find that their systems focus on the major offences that lead to traffic accidents such as speed, drunken driving, driver fatigue, reckless driving, disobeying traffic signs etc. And not every single traffic offence leads to a demerit,” he said. “If one looks at the current South African system it is clear that it is over-designed and too onerous as it focuses on the driver and the vehicle with many vehicle offences carrying both a points penalty and fine. There are more than 2000 offences that carry point demerits. Vehicle technical offences should rather be penalised through fine