The Guardia Civil have the situation covered once vehicles leave
built-up areas and head out onto the open road. If a driver is caught
committing an offence, the corresponding points are deducted from his
or her licence. The problem is inside towns and villages where traffic
control is the responsibility of the Local Police forces. With the
exception of the city of Malaga, none of the municipal forces is
connected to the DGT (National Traffic Department)’s system and
therefore cannot deduct points from a driver’s licence. And so a
motorcyclist without a helmet who is stopped by a Local Police officer
in any town or village might have to pay the relevant fine but his or
her driving licence remains intact: all due to a lack of coordination
between the different authorities. Traffic Department sources confirmed
that Malaga City Hall is the only local authority in the province to be
connected to the system but the addition of other Town Halls is
voluntary.
The workings of the new driving licence points
system are complex. On motorways and other roads outside built-up areas
the responsibility for road safety lies with the Ministry of the
Interior (Guardia Civil), but inside cities, towns and villages it is
down to the local authorities’ own security forces, the Local Police.
The loss of points from a driving licence is the result of a process
which begins with a police report and ends with a final resolution that
must figure on the DGT’s register of offending drivers.
Of all the local authorities in the province only
Malaga City Hall has access to this data base and so a driver in the
province can only lose points if they are stopped by either a Civil
Guard on the road or a Local Police officer in the city. In the rest of
the municipalities committing a traffic offence in a built-up area will
result in no more than a fine.
New connection
Nevertheless the situation is likely to change
over the next few months. The Patronato Provincial de Recaudación (an
institution that is part of the provincial government - Diputación -
and collects taxes and fines on behalf of 62 municipalities) is about
to finalise an agreement with the Provincial Traffic Department in
order to coordinate their data bases and penalise drivers by deducting
points in urban areas. According to the head of the provincial
government’s IT service, Miguel ángel Compais, the system has been
tested and is ready to start working. “We will start with small
municipalities, due to the complexity, and then introduce it to the
medium-sized towns and finally the larger ones. Once the agreement has
been finalised with Tráfico we will have a 20 day trial period, and so
our aim is to start sending information to the register during the
first part of 2008”, he explained.
Towns not included
However this still leaves another 37
municipalities that do not use the services of the Patronato Provincial
de Recaudación, among them Pizarra, Alhaurín el Grande, Mijas,
Fuengirola, Benalmádena and Torremolinos, who manage their own fine and
tax collection systems.
Police sources admit that this unequal situation
is “worrying”, as “it generates the impression that there are
municipalities with a second rate penalty system”. What’s more “the
impression of impunity could lead to more offences”, they claim.
“A complete failure” is how Santiago Córdoba of
the drivers’ defence association AEA (Automovilistas Europeos
Asociados), describes the licence points system. He claims that it
violates the constitutional right to equality in the eyes of the law.
“We can’t accept the fact that if you invade a bus lane in Torrox
nothing happens but if someone else does the same thing in Malaga on
the same day they lose points. It’s discriminatory”.
Since the points system came into force last July
around 4,000 people in the province have had points taken away and 123
have lost their licence altogether.
Regards