Insurance body recommends revoking licences of illegal road users

The insurance sector is calling on authorities to revoke the licences of people who operate uninsured vehicles as well as motorcyclists who perform stunts on public roads, both of whom are causing companies headaches.
President of the General Insurance Association of Barbados (GIAB) Randy Graham has also expressed “deep” concern that innocent parties in road accidents caused by uninsured drivers and motorcycle riders were being left to suffer unduly.
He said uninsured drivers were among the biggest challenges facing insurance providers, as those individuals were forcing companies to shell out massive amounts of money.
“If you have a comprehensive insurance policy on your car and you are struck by somebody who doesn’t have insurance, your insurance company still pays your damage. So we have been seeing, unfortunately, increased payouts in that regard because more and more cars are on the road without proper insurance, and we have to take care of our clients,” Graham told Barbados TODAY in an interview. “It well could be getting into the millions [of dollars] with some of these damages where there is not another driver to recover from. It is a problem.”
“For us in the insurance sector, the bigger problem is when your car only has third-party insurance on it. If you have third-party insurance on your car and somebody struck you and they don’t have insurance, then you really can’t get your car repaired, because normally the other person would repair your car,” he added.
“Those are the really worrying ones for us because now you have a law-abiding citizen who bought proper insurance and can’t get their car repaired, because somebody broke the law…. Those are the ones that cause us the most grief.”
The GIAB head said the industry was seeing an increase in instances of drivers and riders being unable to pay for another party’s injuries due to inadequate or no insurance, or fleeing the scenes of accidents.
“Those situations are very difficult to deal with, and as a sector, we are really fighting this uninsured car thing because it is causing lots of headaches for law-abiding citizens,” he contended.
Turning his attention specifically to dirt bikes and three-wheeled all-terrain vehicles (ATVs), Graham recommended the revocation of the licences of riders who perform stunts on public roads.
“…. They need to have their licences revoked because the public roads are not built for those stunts. You can go up to Bushy Park and do those stunts, but not on the public roads,” he insisted.
Graham said while there was no structured collaboration between the industry and the Barbados Police Service to clamp down on traffic offenders, the sector would be willing to cooperate in conducting public awareness campaigns to “let everyone know that these things are not allowed because it is a safety risk on the roads”.
The GIAB head also revealed that the association would be seeking a meeting with the Ministry of Transport to arrange a meeting to discuss the Government’s position on how the insurance industry should treat motorised bicycles which, he said, are on the increase.
“It is a discussion we should start sooner rather than later, as more and more now come onto the road,” the spokesman for the general insurance fraternity said.
“I don’t think we have gotten any requests from the bicycles with the motors asking for insurance. As a sector, we would want to support it once they are properly policed on the road to avoid incidents. We would have to make sure that if they are licensed and they are using the roads in the same way as a motorcycle…we wouldn’t want to come and say we are not giving them insurance,” Graham added.
(EJ)