The Minister of Transport, Communications and Works, Mr. Yiannis Karousos chaired today a session of the Road Safety Council (RSC), with the participation of the Minister of Justice and Public Order, Ms. Stefis Drakos, members of the Police, and other relevant services.
In his remarks after the meeting, Mr. Karousos, referring to the issues discussed by the Council, noted that there was an initial analysis of the statistics by the Police, whose members were also informed of ways and points to strengthen policing on the basis of statistics. For example, the Minister explained, "we see that about half of the fatalities had occurred between the hours of 4 and 8pm so we will see an enhancement of policing on the basis of those statistics."
In addition, the Transport Minister explained that the targeting will focus on fostering road awareness from an early age. To promote the inclusion of programmes in the school curriculum, Karousos said a meeting with the Minister of Education would be arranged in the near future. The aim is for children to be educated on road safety from kindergarten to their graduation year. "They are currently being done, but they are only done in one class in high school and junior high school. We will very significantly enhance the culture and education on road safety issues," he said."
In addition, the EPA today approved two grant programs in terms of protective equipment. According to the Minister, "One has to do with child seats for buses, since the county now requires passengers under the age of 6 to be seated in a special seat. Because we see that there is some issue in purchasing or equipping these buses to resolve these issues there will be budget available. Also if and when approved, the amendment to the law regarding the mandatory use of helmets by cyclists will be passed by the House of Assembly. And for this measure, a grant program will be announced for the purchase of protective helmets for cyclists."
The Minister of Transport also briefed Council members on the contacts made with the media for the purpose of enhancing the promotion of road safety messages.
"I want to thank everyone involved in road safety and the Minister of Justice and the Police, the Road Safety Unit of the Ministry of Transport, our volunteers because in these initiatives that we have undertaken, we see that more people, more citizens, more volunteers, more experts are joining us and a lot of useful suggestions and proposals are coming and we are trying to implement them to improve on the issue of road safety. The goal is no deaths from road collisions. The political will is there, the budgets are there, the legislative or other initiatives are there and I am sure that we will have positive results in the coming months."
In response to a reporter's question about whether the number of cameras on the road will be increased, Mr. Karousos said that "the Acceptance Committee checks and cross-checks whether the company is complying with the terms of its contract. If and when the terms of the contract are met, the next phase, which is essentially the first phase - because we are leaving the pilot - provides for thepurchase of 16 more mobile cameras and essentially we will reach the number of 20 across Cyprus and the installation of 24 more fixed cameras. These will operate for some months after they are installed and again the same procedure will be followed as the pilot, that is to say we will see what problems there are if the specifications are met if everything works according to the terms of the offer. If and when we are satisfied we will proceed to the next phase in order to complete the installation of all 120 cameras throughout Cyprus."
Asked about the delay in sending outgoing bills, Mr. Karousos replied "a very important improvement has been made, these days the processing is being completed by the Receiving Committee which is checking the outgoing bills. Under the contract they have to be sent 5 days from the day they are processed. Basically we need a day for some technical issues, it's 6 days that deadline. We have seen a significant improvement. In March almost no out-of-court letters had gone out by mid-May-early June about 75% of the out-of-court letters had gone out. The rest there were some issues but we resolved all the agencies. But we will know in the next few days how to proceed. The aim is to send the out-of-court notice as soon as possible and we are also preparing amendments to the relevant legislation so that the offender can be informed electronically that he has been denounced with all the advantages this will offer."
For her part, the Minister of Justice and Public Order Ms Stefi Drakou in her statements at the end of the council said that "the recent fatal accidents are a serious concern for us and was a topic of discussion today. We are concerned because both the Police and my colleague, the Minister, despite all the actions, policing, enlightenment, grants that the Ministry is doing, however, we have not been able to see a reduction in fatal accidents. I certainly reiterate my position that we need to create road safety awareness and convince people that the safe driving code must be observed. That is why we have agreed today that my colleague and I will request a meeting with the Minister of Education to see how programmes can be included from a very young age to a very old age that are now aimed at creating this road awareness. There are already enlightenment programmes, there are already programmes in our schools, but we believe that is where we need to target and where we will pay particular attention. In the coming weeks, we will be scheduling a meeting that we need to hear from the minister responsible on education issues. We also agreed that there will be policing because we have noticed that many of the accidents are due to illegal right turns. We will make more use of the statistics and the places where they happened to see whether location also plays a role so that specific measures can be taken. For example, we identify that some of the right-hand illegal turn accidents are because there is a petrol station or parking lot on the other side, so we discussed how we can take some measures in such cases. We looked at several other issues and the National Road Safety Action Plan and we will continue to make an effort because it is certainly unfair to see people getting lost on the asphalt and we will intensify all our actions in all directions, but targeted more in terms of creating road safety awareness.
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