How to comply with the law - Part 2
Submitted by Edmund Gall on Wed, 03/03/2010 - 17:59
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 Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic Act Ch 48_50.pdf | 332.65 KB |
I wish to thank the Hon. Minister of Works and Transport, Colm Imbert, for correcting me by way of his Letter to the Editor (Trinidad Guardian, 02 Mar 2010, http://guardian.co.tt/commentary/letters/2010/03/02/ambiguity-law-being-corrected). He responded to issues I raised in How to comply with the law - Part 1, and advised that:
- The Motor Vehicle and Road Traffic Act Ch 48:50 (MVRTA) does NOT state the President of the Republic of T&T is allowed to use the national Coat of Arms (CoA) on his vehicles' licence plates
- The MVRTA makes no reference to the CoA at all
- The currently proposed bill, 9/2010 The Motor Vehicles and Road Traffic (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, 2010, only deals with updating regulations and does not address the use of the CoA on the Prime Minister's vehicles.
The Minister also advised that "overseas letter writers need to get their facts straight before rushing to print." I agree, but humbly suggest that this be extended to residents of T&T, including government Ministers. I hope taking two days to re-check the facts for my response is not rushing.
I couldn't get 'true facts' from the government's own websites. I tried to get an up-to-date version of the MVRTA at the T&T Parliament's website (www.ttparliament.org) but found only five of the amendments to the MVRTA (from 2000, 2001 and 2007) and the first reading of Bill 9/2010 (the second reading version laid in the Senate is missing); it didn't have the complete Act. I tried searching the Attorney General's website via links available on the Min. of Legal Affairs and Freedom of Information Act websites, but neither of these work (www.ag.gov.tt and www.agla.gov.tt). I eventually found a copy of the MVRTA on the Min. of Legal Affairs website but this appears to be old - it makes no mention of changes made in 2001 or 2007 and the Schedules are incomplete and doesn't appear to incorporate the changes stipulated on the T&T Parliament's website (e.g. changes for the breathalyser).
So I was forced to go on the basis of these websites' documents and the reports in the local daily newspapers, the Trinidad Guardian (TG) and Trinidad Express (TE). One other fact I got wrong was when the CoA first appeared on the PM's car; it wasn't late 2008. The NAR first raised the issue via their news release in Mar 2006 (TG, 16 Mar 2006, http://legacy.guardian.co.tt/archives/2006-03-16/news3.html), but they didn't object based on the MVRTA; they just questioned whether the Transport Commissioner approved the use of the CoA on the PM's car.
It wasn't until Nov 2008 that other questions were raised on the legality of the PM's car's licence plate (report by Darryl Heeralal, TE, 27 Nov 2008, http://www.trinidadexpress.com/index.pl/article_news?id=161406543). This reporter claimed that the Ag. Police Commissioner, James Philbert, was investigating who was liable for the "illegal use of the coat of arms on one of the Prime Minister’s vehicles" and implied the contravened law was the MVRTA. I thus based my view on this report. Min. Imbert refuted these claims the day this report was published and rightly noted, as he did in his response to my latest letter, that the MVRTA makes no reference to the CoA and only excludes the President from registering his vehicles (28 Nov 2008, TG, http://legacy.guardian.co.tt/archives/2008-11-28/news5.html). He also absolved the PM from any responsibility, since the PM is just a 'passenger' and not the 'owner' or 'user' of the car, a viewpoint which is extremely curious in logic.
Here is where the Hon. Minister and I disagree. Based on the MVRTA obtained from the Ministry of Legal Affairs website (http://rgd.legalaffairs.gov.tt/Laws2/Chs._48-53/48.50/48.50_aos.htm and PDF attached below):
- Section 12.3 says that "The Transport Officer ... shall assign to the vehicle a registered letter or letters and number, which shall become the identification mark of such vehicle." - so, the identification mark for a vehicle registered by the Licensing Authority shall comprise a registered letter or letter/number combination, not a picture of the CoA;
- Section 12.5 deals with registration of vehicles: "If a motor vehicle does not bear on it an identification mark as required by the Licensing Authority, this fact shall be regarded as prima facie evidence that the vehicle has not been registered, and any constable may detain such a vehicle until enquiries have been made." - so, the PM's car requires at least one licence plate with PBM 1 on it to match the Licensing Authority's registration records, unless it is one of those cars excluded from registration under the Act;
- Section 16.1 states which vehicles are exempt from the need for registration - the PM's car is NOT one of these.
So while Min. Imbert has corrected me, he hasn't addressed major questions. I concede that the proposed bill doesn't explicitly make the use of the CoA on the PM's car legal, but it does seek "to empower the Minister to prescribe the identification mark of a vehicle of the State" - which once passed, would make use of the CoA in all colours of the rainbow possible at the stroke of the Minister's pen. I am not concerned about the National Emblems Act, or any authorisation by the Hon. Min. of National Security for the use of the CoA - if a picture of the PM's official residence was used on the licence plate of PBM 1, it would appear to be wrong under the MVRTA.
In short, Min. Imbert:
- Your fellow citizens, whether residing in T&T or outside of it, would like to check facts but can't seem to get them from the government's own websites (despite lofty promises from the Minister of Public Administration);
- It still appears that the PM's car is NOT appropriately authorised, four years after first questioned, to use a silver Coat of Arms on its licence plates in place of its registration mark recorded by the Licensing Authority (PBM 1), according to the facts available on the government websites and local press;
- If any other citizen, besides the PM and President, replaced their licence plates with ones containing pictures and drove them on T&T's roads tomorrow, would they be complying with the law?
- Even though the PM is only a passenger of PBM 1, is it appropriate for him to ignore the public's questions about its legality for four years?
- Can you ask the Attorney General or the Ag. Commissioner of Police (if he's changed his views) to make a clear statement on this?
I unreservedly apologise for errors I made in presenting the facts available to me. I also think Min. Imbert should wonder why the Ag. Commissioner of Police, members of the media and citizens like me have come to the same interpretation of the facts independently, and if there are 'false facts' in the public domain, what should be done to correct them - especially those on government websites.
In the context of crime management, economic challenges, lack of health services and other national issues, this may appear to be insignificant. A CoA on the PM's car doesn't take food out of a citizen's mouth. However, there is a right way to do things in a democracy that observes the rule of law. If the PM wishes to use the CoA on his car's licence plates, first change the laws and then change the plates. Instead, it appears that he's done it in reverse order. This undermines the relevant Ministers' call for the public to obey the law, when the PM's car doesn't appear to obey such a simple law as vehicle registration.
While Min. Imbert is working on the above, perhaps he can also clarify whether any technical measuring device for determining dark tints on motor vehicles has been implemented, with associated revisions to regulations, that does not depend significantly on a policeman's eyesight, ambient sunlight or the vehicle's interior colours. Why? Bill 9/2010 proposes to increase the penalty for dark-tinted vehicles to a $2,000 fixed fine and 15 points, and $5,000 if unsuccessfully challenged in the courts (again based on news reports since I can't get the bill from the government's websites). For such a huge penalty, one would think that the Hon. Minister would implement an objective, technically-sound method for measuring tints' darkness rather than subjective human eyesight. We're just wondering if he'll apply the same, proper thinking that led to reliance on breathalysers instead of policemen's noses.
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Comments
changing the laws
Hi there Edmund
I think you might find that the reason they tried to change the law about the achievement of arms being on the PM's car is plain and simple ignorance. The original grant of arms is lost, at least it was up until 8 years ago, when I met with a committee about it, and naturally the documentation sent with it was also misplaced. So with this information missing, how is the government to know what is right and what is wrong on matters heraldic? Well the simple answer would be for them to contact the Crown Office and get a copy of the laws governing heraldic devices and not foolishly take matters into their own hands and apply law changing conventions on something they clearly do not understand. But it would seem letting the professionals do what they do best is not something we can hope for.
Paul Antonio
Calligrapher and Heraldic Artist
Paul@pascribe.com