Police to clampdown on vehicles in breach of law

By Admin. Updated 10:06 a.m., Thursday, December 22, 2022, Atlantic Standard Time (GMT-4).

Police say they will soon clampdown on motor vehicles that are in breach of the Motor Vehicle and Road Traffic Act.

Sergeant Kenny Jones of the Traffic Department of the Royal St. Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force told the State-owned Agency for Public Information – API earlier this week that his department has noticed a number of breaches.

He said one of the concerns is that, “motorists continue to use their vehicles at night with other lighted lamps and also with coloured rears.”

He said: “under the Motor Vehicle and Road Traffic Act it states that on the road at night, every vehicle should be equipped with two headlamps to the front and those headlamps should be lighted and the rears from those should be Uncoloured.”

He said it is an offence under the Motor Vehicle and Road Traffic Act to use any other lights.

“Once you are being caught in breach,” of the Act, “you will be prosecuted,” he said.

He said: “we also continue to see persons using their vehicles with swiveling lights and different blinking and flashing lights. We also want them to know that this is an offense and the must desist from this practice.”

“We are going to give them time to regularize their motor vehicles because hopefully, in the early new year, we would be clamping down on these irregularities when it comes to lights on the road at night,” he said.

He said another irregularly noticed is that persons are altering or removing the bumper from their motor vehicles.

“We also want persons to know that this is an offence when it comes to maintaining the construction of that motor vehicle, and we also want them to desist from that practice,” he said.

“The law also gives the police, any police officer, [the authority] to remove that motor vehicle from the road and also to remove the number plates from that motor vehicle until that motor vehicle is put in the order that it should be in regards to its maintenance, the equipment of that motor vehicle, and construction of that motor vehicle on the streets of St. Vincent and the Grenadines,” he said.

He said the police are asking the public to adhere to the regulations, as soon they will be carrying out a clampdown with motor vehicles in breach of the Motor Vehicle and Road Traffic Act to bring them in keeping with those pieces of traffic regulations.

The traffic branch says it has also noted the use of number plates which are not prescribed.

Another breach the police have said they’ve noticed is the removal of silencers from vehicle mufflers.

Persons are also being reminded to wear seatbelts.