Traffic Breaches Still Matters For Courts

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30446, 21 May 1964, Page 18

Traffic Breaches Still Matters For Courts

As long as minor traffic breaches were offences, it was essential that they be dealt with in the courts, said the Minister bf Justice (Mr Hanan), replying to the City Council’s representations for a system of direct payment of parking infringement penalties.

The suggested system was the reason for the introduction of the standard fines procedure under which the senior magistrate in any town could fix a standard penalty for certain traffic offences and if this was paid by the offender after receiving a notice from the court no court hearing was necessary, the Minister said. This did away with some of the objections to the use of ordinary court procedure in minor traffic cases. There was a saving of time for traffic officers and the defendant received a notice instead of a summons.

To the council’s contention that many persons were upset when they received a summons, the Minister said this would not occur if the offence was one brought within the standards fines procedure in the town concerned unless the person took no action on receipt of the notice.

The Minister said he presumed the objection of the council to this scheme was that it still required the offence to be dealt with by court process, even though not in the normal manner.

Basically, however, the Minister felt that this was an objection to the fact that minor traffic breaches were offences at all. The traffic committee said it proposed to give the matter further consideration.