MANILA, Philippines — It is the people in the Land Transportation Office’s (LTO) driver’s seat who need restraint the most, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said Wednesday.
“It is behind the epidemic of new fees. It has become a super spreader of high fines,” Recto lamented in a statement.
He noted the “confusion” on rules issued by the LTO.
“The lack of coherence of which is the regulatory equivalent of distracted driving,” the senator said.
Recto specifically cited as an example LTO’s dilly-dallying on imposing fines against violators of mandatory use of face shields, and its rollout of the Motor Vehicle Inspection System, which he said has been marred by “chaos.”
READ: LTO insists on face mask-wearing inside private vehicles, but violators won’t be fined yet
Just this week, an LTO official drew flak for suggesting families with tall kids instead use bigger cars to comply with the law that mandates the use of child car seats to prevent injuries and death to children passengers.
“In the not-so-distant past, perfectly good car plates were yanked out in favor of new ones, which arrived late and which should be installed with new bolts as if these were made with space technology,” Recto also pointed out.
“And then there was the case of licenses and stickers, which took longer to produce than space rockets.”
“Through the years, we have watched how a big diversified downstream industry run by private companies who profit from regulations has grown,” he added.
The senator recognized that many of LTO’s programs have laudable intentions “but the implementation is far from lovable.”
And he blamed it on the lack of widespread consultations with stakeholders.
While there are good people in the Department of Transportation, Recto lamented that the rail sector “is running at full speed, above and below ground (subway).”
“Sadly, these gains are being drowned out by the ruckus in the land transportation sector,” he further said.
Recto then suggested that before imposing fines, this should first go through a review by the appropriate congressional committee and subject to the approval of the Office of the President.