To ensure some minimal standard for traffic system operation and safety, a system of traffic laws and regulations is necessary. Enforcement of these traffic laws is believed to influence driving behaviour through a mechanism of deterrence: the threat of legal punishment should convince road users to refrain from committing violations, which would result in an improvement of traffic safety. Traditionally, the responsibility and competence for the enforcement of traffic laws is in the hands of the police. In the past decades, vehicle mobility has experienced an enormous growth, leading to a proportional increase in the number of cars on the road and associated traffic offences, and a more complex traffic system in general. As a consequence, the police role in traffic has become more extensive and complex. However, police capacity has not increased proportionally. In most European countries it is commonly agreed upon that police resources are scarce. Moreover, in general, traffic enforcement activities do not have the highest priority or status in police forces that have a general policing task. Therefore, other measures are implemented and explored that contribute to safe behaviour on the roads and that lessen the burden of traffic enforcement placed on the police. With this situation on the background, in several European countries a tendency has arisen to explore the possibility of transferring certain traffic law enforcement tasks to non-police organisations. Without attempting to be exhaustive, in the current study a number of different situations in Europe has been reviewed in which non-police based organisations are taking part in the total traffic enforcement system or in which such systems are experimented with. Examples of these non-police enforcement tasks were speed enforcement by local authorities (Germany), driver improvement measures conducted by specialised governmental authorities (France), periodical vehicle inspections by private companies (Finland) and fiscal and administrative enforcement of parking by local authorities (the Netherlands). It was attempted to broadly identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of these systems. The situations reviewed in Finland and France are relatively the least controversial since they involve situations where the role of police traditionally has been small or non-existent. Up until the end of 1992, periodical vehicle inspections in Finland were the exclusive responsibility of a government bureau, the Central Motor Vehicle Register. From the beginning of 1993 the Central Motor Vehicle Register ceased to operate as a government bureau, and its status was changed to that of a state-owned commercial enterprise. In 1996 it was incorporated as a joint stock company, in which case there may be owners other than the state. Privatization of the vehicle inspection system was carried out also in other ways. Thus, the reviewed changes to traditional vehicle inspection in Finland mainly involve a transfer of government tasks to commercially operated institutions. As the results of an evaluation study show, in this case the transfer may have positive effects on public acceptance, since some groups of drivers even seem to think they may personally profit from the choice between government controlled and commercially operated institutions. In France, a licence demerit point system has been introduced in 1992 to drive back recidivism rates in traffic violations. Associated with this, driver improvement courses are conducted by which convicted drivers can recover their lost licence points. State authorities are responsible for the accreditation of course centres and their staff. This traffic management system can be regarded as an important support system for the police in reducing the number of traffic offences on the road. The French example presents the substitution of traditional punishment by fine or imprisonment by the alternative of participating in a driver improvement course. In both cases the options that are open to the driver are enlarged and the role of the (traffic) police is only marginally affected or is not at issue at all. The Dutch and German examples bring us closer to the heart of the controversy surrounding non-police based enforcement. They pertain directly to the transfer of important responsibilities of the (traffic) police to other institutions. In some European countries the legal basis for the operation of governmental bodies as enforcement authorities is already existing. It was found that in the majority of German federal states, local authorities have the legal competence to operate as traffic enforcement authorities. Although this type of enforcement appears not to be widespread yet, it is expected that in the future more municipalities will exercise their role as an enforcement authority. The main advantage of this type of enforcement seems to be the enormous increase in enforcement capacity that can be achieved. The main threats that were identified for this type of enforcement are: (i) municipalities making traffic safety objectives subordinate to the financial gain that can be generated by enforcement efforts; (ii) co-ordination problems associated with different authorities carrying out the same enforcement tasks; and (iii) problems related to public acceptance. However, (the limited) research results in Germany demonstrated that the selection of enforcement sites in municipalities conducting enforcement is mainly based on traffic safety aspects. Most local authorities report a close co-operation with the police concerning enforcement time and location as well as in the prosecution of offenders. Overall the municipalities report a good acceptance of their enforcement activities by road users. Finally, most of them report speed and accident reductions as a result of the speed enforcement. Similar considerations apply to the introduction of administrative and fiscal parking enforcement in the Netherlands. To increase police capacity and relieve the workload in courts at the same time, in the nineties traffic law enforcement in the Netherlands increasingly made use of detection and prosecution of violations on the basis of administrative law. The system allows large-scale processing of cases due to its simplified procedure. It is no longer necessary to establish the identity of the offender, as the owner of the vehicle is assumed culpable. In financial terms, the system is very profitable to the state. The temptation, perhaps even policy, consequently may be to maximise profits rather than the objectives of traffic safety. To further relieve the police from traffic related enforcement tasks, parking violations in a growing number of municipalities in the Netherlands can now be processed under fiscal law. Fiscalising parking violations (non-payment of parking) enables authorities other than police - i.e. local ‘tax’ authorities - to carry out enforcement tasks. The following threats or possible negative consequences of these ‘innovations in enforcement’ were identified: (i) Instead of regulating quality of life and accessibility of cities, taxes and fees might very well be used to regulate the city’s budget deficit; and (ii) Surveillance may be concentrated on violations that are simple to register and in areas where registration is straightforward. Enforcement of offences that do not require a direct contact between the enforcement authority and the driver, are most eligible for a transfer to non-police bodies. However, a total loss of contact between drivers and the police (or other appropriate enforcement agency could lead to a decrease the acceptance of the traffic policing. (Author/publisher) For an overview off all working papers and deliverables of the ESCAPE project, see http://virtual.vtt.fi/virtual/proj6/escape/deliver.htm
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