Cyprus Mail 6 October 2020
Traffic violations in the first 24 hours after authorities imposed new heftier fines for offences on October 1 did not change at all, according to police.
On Thursday, the first day the new penalties came into effect, there were 634 violations islandwide, a police spokesman said. “This means that drivers weren’t affected by the heavier fines. They just don’t care,” he added.
He might be right, given that a food delivery man was killed by a hit-and-run-drunk driver only a day later, or it might just be taking some time to sink in and after someone is fined, they’ll think twice about offending again and slowly it will trickle down into a tangible reduction in offences.
In 2019, there were 48 deaths from fatal traffic accidents, while the country recorded 67 deaths per million inhabitants, according to data from Eurostat. This is higher than the EU average of 51 deaths per million.
If we roughly compare, in the case of Cyprus, around 67 deaths per million, with the 20 deaths caused by Covid-19 – translating to 18.5 per million – so far on the island, it could be said that it’s more dangerous for a driver and for others on the road, to sit behind the wheel of a car. But no one thinks they’re going to die or kill someone else when they turn the key in the ignition every day.
The difference is the perception with Covid-19 that you could catch it and die, or pass it on to someone vulnerable, and so people take more precautions. Not everyone mind you, but since fines were hiked considerably on August 1 for being caught without a mask in an enclosed public space, the number of offenders has dropped dramatically.
A quick look back shows that on August 3, police had fined 23 businesses and 57 individuals for Covid violations. They’ve been carrying out on average 500 checks daily, some days more, some days a bit less, but violations have steadily dropped, most days to between 10 and 20. Most people, even if they are unfazed by coronavirus itself, simply don’t want to take the risk of incurring a 300 euro fine.
The message is that with Covid violations, police have shown they mean business. They’re probably not catching every offender, but they have made inroads, coupled with a change of mentality in people when it comes to the risk of disease or being responsible for passing it on to someone else.
If drivers could realise that the mechanism is the same – think about others before thinking about yourself – there would already be fewer road deaths.
Justice Minister Emily Yiolitis said the new fines would bring results after a reasonable amount of time, if not immediately. She said punishments were part of the whole effort and not an end in themselves.
But until the driving mentality changes, police will need to remain as dedicated to catching traffic offenders as they are to catching Covid violators or else the whole effort will have been wasted.
