The need to achieve distance apart during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic was subjected to a thousand dollar fine During that period, which ran from January 1, 2020 until February of this year the police issued 1854 such fines and fewer than a quarter have been paid in full.
It seems that most have been ignored . Just 246 have been reviewed, resulting in 206 being upheld, 12 withdrawn and 23 replaced with a caution. All these fines would have returned $ 1,854,000 to the government but the return to Treasury has been a mere $ 415,000.
If nothing else, this fine fiasco illustrates the gross unfairness of fixed sum fines being applied to offences without the slightest examination of that persons ability to pay or their age. Some of these thousand dollar fines were handed out to children aged between ten and eighteen and few of these would have any taxable income.
By edict, most businesses were forced to close and while several government relief schemes kept wages constant a lot of individuals slipped through the net and lost their means of support. It is what happens next that becomes a burden on these people.
It is likely these unpaid fines will pass to the government Debt Recovery office, which will pursue them relentlessly. When the debtor eventually returns to the workforce a " garnishee " will probably be served on their employer requiring a portion of their wage to be withheld and paid to the debt recovery department.
It is also likely that issues like obtaining a driving license, or registering a car may be refused until such unpaid debts are settled. In fact, unpaid fines may be taken into account when the debtor applies for a housing loan later in life.
In certain circumstances, such debtors may find themselves serving time in prison because of the unpaid debt. In past years, this was a favourite means of wiping the slate clean, mainly used by young men for motoring offences.
Both the severity and the punishment value of a fine is directly related to the wealth of the person fined. This will be exacerbated by the withdrawal of warning notices and the extending of hours for mobile speed camera use which is now in effect. Exceeding the posted limit by a mere fraction will now incur an automatic fine of equal magnitude to a wealthy business person, a pensioner or perhaps a student driving to university.
Ability to pay is not taken into account. What some people would accept in their stride would be catastrophic to those on a lower level of society, and this is handed out daily when a fixed sum fine is applicable to every day transgressions.
Our fine system is simply grossly unfair. But it seems that those thousand dollar pandemic fines will be allowed to run their course !
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