DIKO deputy Nicos Pittokopitis plans to propose in parliament this week a controversial annual £10 surcharge on vehicle owners as part of measures aimed at curbing the increasing rate of road deaths in Cyprus.
The Chairman of the House Communications Committee told state radio on Monday that he planned to submit four new proposals, one of which could spark objections from motorists unwilling to pay an extra charge for road safety.
The proposals include the introduction of a £10 surcharge on each vehicle to cover the costs of a new police unit which would monitor roads and highways, the confiscation of vehicles driven by underage drivers, penalties to parents of underage drivers and a compulsory awareness campaign run by the media.
The new unit would include 150 to 200 new staff whose sole task would be to monitor the roads on a 24-hour basis. According to yesterday’s Alithia, there are 570,000 vehicles registered in Cyprus, which would yield a yearly revenue of £5.7 million to cover the costs of the new unit.
“We need to take drastic measures, and stop using the excuse of lack of personnel. The unit should be working exclusively on monitoring all highways and implementing the Highway Code on a 24-hour basis,” said Pittokopitis.
The DIKO deputy said he did not believe the charge would be considered excessive. “Don’t tell me that this (£10) will change the quality of life of citizens, but it will give more chances for Cypriot citizens to live.”
DISY deputy and Committee member Georgios Georgiou said all proposals were welcome but he would wait to see the surcharge proposal in writing before commenting on it. “Meanwhile, as a party, we expect to study the government’s strategic action plan on road safety soon, which the communications minister promised would be submitted in the new year,” said Georgiou.
However, DISY deputy Maria Kyriacou told the Cyprus Mail she did not think the £10 charge would solve the problem.
“There are other ways to deal with this. We could make cut backs in police expenditure in other areas, like they do in Europe and America, and use the money better.”
Kyriacou referred to the use of cameras as an alternative to creating a new unit of 200 police officers: “Cameras can do a good job of monitoring roads.”
“One way of cutting costs is to stop calling police out for minor road accidents, where there are no injuries. Instead of calling police to the scene and creating huge traffic jams by keeping the cars in the middle of the road, people can do as in Europe, and swap insurance information, letting insurance companies deal with the problem themselves,” said Kyriacou.
“We need to study the problem… not just with one proposal. I believe we need a different kind of management of the police force, a more contemporary management,” she added.
By using modern technology in monitoring roads and simplifying procedures for minor accidents, police could greatly reduce their costs, Kyriacou maintained.
Meanwhile, Education Minister Pefkios Georgiou told the House Education Committee yesterday that road safety was one of the burning issues troubling society and the state. He called for a collective effort to take drastic measures to protect people, more particularly our children and youth against the grim reaper of the roads”.
Georgiades said the ministry had taken a number of measures to battle the problem of road deaths, including the introduction of books on road safety, participation of pupils in a television road safety game show and school visits to the Road Safety Education Park, created by the police. He added that the issue of using school buses for state schools was also under consideration.
The increased concern over road safety comes after last week’s deaths of a school teacher in a road accident and in another incident, the deaths of a brother and sister who were hit by a racing motorbike while walking home from school.
Cyprus comes third in the EU, after Portugal and Greece, in the number of road deaths per population.
