DOUBLE DEMERITS WORKS – NO HARM IN A TRIAL TO TEST IT

The Tasmanian Greens today said that with 676 motorists booked for road traffic offences over Easter, there is no room for the complacency shown by Minister for Infrastructure David O’Byrne last week, when he was reported as saying that he was not interested in trialling double demerit points on selected days because he had seen no evidence that it worked.
Greens Infrastructure spokesperson Tim Morris MP said that it is not hard to find evidence that the introduction of double demerit points on selected holidays continues to reduce the number of crashes in Western Australia. The NMRA also suggests that it is helping reduce the crash frequency in NSW and the ACT.
“The Greens welcome the Liberals’ interest in coming on board with our proposal and I will be happy to sit down with Rene Hidding to work out the finer details,” said Mr Morris.
“Clearly having 676 motorists being booked over the Easter holiday period is far too many. It is good fortune there were no reported serious incidences or fatalities. What the Greens are proposing is a low-cost mechanism for reducing the number of drivers speeding.”
“There is a misconception in the community that speeding fines will also be doubled but this is incorrect. It is only the demerit points that are doubled, as a result it would be expected that less motorists would speed and therefore less revenue would be raised, but road safety would be improved.”
“This makes it basically a win-win scenario and is all the more mysterious why Mr O’Byrne would oppose it.”
“The deterrent effect is that drivers know that if they are caught speeding during the double demerit point period that they will almost certainly lose their licence for a high level speeding detection.”
“Minister O’Byrne should put the words ‘double demerit points evaluation’ into Google; if he does he will find that he was wrong last week and that there is plenty of evidence that the introduction of double demerit points for holiday periods has had a positive influence on reducing the number of crashes,” said Mr Morris.
Tim Morris MP Greens Infrastructure spokesperson