Fun is now officially over – China to disqualify any drunk drivers from driving
From April 1st 2010, China is planning to have another major crack down on all drink drivers and behind the wheel offenders. After a series of horrendous traffic accidents involving drunk drivers in 2009 and 2008 the Chinese government ordered the police to have a major crack down on drunk drivers who know will now face some fairly stiff punishments in 2010.
From April 1st, any driver who is caught with a blood alcohol level will be have 12 points taken from his license and ultimately disqualified from driving. The Chinese driving license system does work in the opposite way to many other countries, with drivers starting with 12 points and then these points being taken away for various driving digressions or parking violations.
Also, drivers caught with fake licenses, or fake plates, or using cloned plates will also face the mighty hand of the law. Previously the police would reward any driver that changed his plates with a 3 point fine, however this is likely to become more serious over the next few weeks, face licenses and fake plates will land a driver with a 12 point fine.
Furthermore, the fines for speeding or breaking traffic rules are expected to be enlarged, currently they are around 200rmb but are largely at the attending officers discretion, so on occasion they might be as low as 50rmb or as high as 500rmb. For drivers that dont like to buckle up, they will find that police will fine them two points, drivers that go against traffic signs were previously fined 2 points, that will be increased to 3 points.
The increase in punishment is in line with the number of new drivers that took to the roads this year in China, with 14 million cars sold last year and a similar amount this year this accounts for a large number of new drivers on the road who aren’t entirely familiar with the Chinese highway code.
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Great.
It’s a step in the right direction but it will really need to be properly enforced. The current traffic police that I see each day don’t really seem to care so much that people break all the rules. Most of the traffic police are on motorbikes in GZ and the local drivers know they will mostly be hanging around intersections picking off people as they go through the lights. Hardly a proactive force.
If they required all the boffins who drive blue and white cars to pull people over instead of driving the same then things might change sooner rather than later. This is unlikely because while they may be police they are not traffic police.
Also, would these rules apply to the military? They don’t give a s##t about other road users as they are usually “above the law”.
I sometimes wonder how much the police themselves know about Chinese traffic laws. They seem to break them as much if not more than every other accident waiting to happen on the road.
If they would just enforce the old rules and change behaviour of the people it would be fine and new rules are not even necessary.