[May 2013..Dec 2013] The Gauteng E-tolling Thread

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An opportunity for E-toll openness

http://www.outa.co.za/site/an-opportunity-for-etoll-openness/

This Friday marks the end of the period for public comment on the tariffs for Gauteng e-tolls, where after Minister of Transport,Dipuo Peters, now has to consider the comments submitted. When she has done so, the Minister must publish in the Government Gazette the final tariffs, along with a date for the start of e-tolls.

OUTA believes there will be far fewer submissions issued from the public this time around, as previous contributions to the eToll tariffs, on no less than two prior occasions, were graced with no feedback to the public. “What is the purpose of these input sessions, if no published response to the public to acknowledge the extent of feedback and general summary of the content and input provided?” says Wayne Duvenage, Chairman of OUTA.

In November 2012, the Department of Transport indicated they received over 11,000 submissions on the tariff notices. In addition, they received verbal feedback during three public engagement sessions. Then again on 24 May this year proposed tariffs and draft regulations for e-tolls were published for public comment. Apart from the tariffs, there were no less than five sets of regulations covering everything from how to affix an e-tag to exemption for public transport vehicles.

The period for public comment ended on 23 June and again, there was silence as the Minister considered the comments. On 9 October the final regulations were published. Unlike the tariffs, the regulations were not open for further public comment.

This means that members of the public were unable to know what comments had been submitted on each of the draft regulations, nor what the response of the Minister was to them. An interested member of the public could do no more than compare the drafts with the final versions to try and identify changes. Even then, the process would not reveal which changes had been promoted by a comment from a member of the public, and even less what comments had been made which had not been accepted.

That is water under the bridge, though it is a matter which should be addressed in any future public participation exercise – and not only in the case of e-tolls.

This time around, the Minister has an opportunity to show that she is fully committed to assessing and involving the opinions of the public and when publishing the final toll tariffs, the Minister should at the same time produce a commentary of what the public has said – in response to her invitation to comment – and what her response is to those comments.
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Ol' Mean Bastid said:
we were promised at the public sessions that feedback would be issued, there was bugger all, Dipuo Peters seems even worse than her predecessor and based on her comments so far hell bent on pushing this through, I wouldn't hold my breath that she would pay one little iota's attention to public opinion
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To be fair, I think she has exactly 0 leeway on this. She wouldn't be there if she had any power to stop it.
 
I track my emails with yesware and my submission still hasn't been clicked on or opened yet...
 
DJ... said:
I track my emails with yesware and my submission still hasn't been clicked on or opened yet...
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And if the user decides not to confirm receipt? Not that I expect them to open it, it's all just a farce anyway.
 
DJ... said:
I track my emails with yesware and my submission still hasn't been clicked on or opened yet...
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I'd imagine that kind of tracing stuff is stripped out by mime sweeper or something similar?
 
Wyzak said:
And if the user decides not to confirm receipt? Not that I expect them to open it, it's all just a farce anyway.
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I'm not 100% sure how it works, but, it logs every single time someone opens, clicks, or replies to the mail, also their location and device used to open it. So if you open my mail 4 times and reply once, I'll know all about it, including which devices you opened it on and from where. Not sure if that relies on traditional read receipts...
 
Garyvdh said:
I'm not holding my breath.
But to me every delay helps.

But yes, at the end of the day... this battle will still come down to the citizens alone.
We all know that by now.
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When we see look at how long Number One has used the courts to weasel out of handing over the spy tapes and 2002 Zimbabwe election report the implementation of e-tolling could be delayed for years.

Unfortunately the battle will not come down to the citizens alone because the vast majority do not understand the meaning of voting and will do as they are told by party thugs. The forthcoming election will along the same lines as the election that turned Rhodesia over to Mugabe.
 
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nightjar said:
When we see look at how long Number One has used the courts to weasel out of handing over the spy tapes and 2002 Zimbabwe election report the implementation of e-tolling could be delayed for years.

Unfortunately the battle will not come down to the citizens alone because the vast majority do not understand the meaning of voting and will do as they are told by party thugs. The forthcoming election will along the same lines as the election that turned Rhodesia over to Mugabe.
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I wasn't referring to the elections, I was referring to the fact that in order for the system to fail completely, the citizens have to do nothing.
 
DJ... said:
I'm not 100% sure how it works, but, it logs every single time someone opens, clicks, or replies to the mail, also their location and device used to open it. So if you open my mail 4 times and reply once, I'll know all about it, including which devices you opened it on and from where. Not sure if that relies on traditional read receipts...
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I don't see how it could work if the person turns of the receipts and his firewall or AV blocks any embedded code which would otherwise have to be in the email, but that's besides the point really.

nightjar said:
When we see look at how long Number One has used the courts to weasel out of handing over the spy tapes and 2002 Zimbabwe election report the implementation of e-tolling could be delayed for years.
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Nope, in that case he has something to lose by having those tapes become public. In this case he has something to lose by delaying etolls. It will be implemented within months.
 
Garyvdh said:
I wasn't referring to the elections, I was referring to the fact that in order for the system to fail completely, the citizens have to do nothing.
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The battle will be lost if the system is allowed to come into operation because the few hidden beneficiaries have the connections to ensure mass arrests of defaulters by police. A few hundred people locked in cells over a weekend, and subject to all sorts of violence, will be enough to terrorise the rest of the population. The only hope is to play Zuma's delaying game and spin things out for a few years.
 
nightjar said:
The battle will be lost if the system is allowed to come into operation because the few hidden beneficiaries have the connections to ensure mass arrests of defaulters by police. A few hundred people locked in cells over a weekend, and subject to all sorts of violence, will be enough to terrorise the rest of the population. The only hope is to play Zuma's delaying game and spin things out for a few years.
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This has consistently been refuted in this thread. Please go and read back.
 
Tolls fight not over: DA

The fight against e-tolling in Gauteng is not over, the DA said on Thursday.

"Without fail, we chose the most cumbersome, the most expensive... system that only benefits a few, rather than considering the majority of this province," said Democratic Alliance spokesman Mmusi Maimane.

"We feel there was a fundamental flaw in the process to begin with."

The DA would bring a high court application to fight the constitutionality of the e-toll bill signed by President Jacob Zuma in September.

The DA believed the bill was incorrectly passed by Parliament and signed into law by Zuma.

It contended that the Constitution made a distinction between bills that had an impact on national government and those which affected provincial government.

Maimane said the bill was incorrectly tagged as a national competency that should be dealt with by the national government.

The Gauteng legislature should have been given an opportunity to vote for or against the bill, he said.

"We believe that the incorrect tagging of the e-toll bill effectively prevented the provincial legislature from deliberating on the e-toll bill on behalf of the affected people," he said.

"The e-tolls bill allows the SA National Roads Agency Ltd [Sanral] to toll roads in Gauteng and every other province."

The DA filed its application in the Western Cape High Court on Wednesday.

It asked the court to hear the matter urgently.

On September 25, Zuma signed into law the Transport Laws and Related Matters Amendment Bill, giving the go-ahead for e-tolling in Gauteng.

A legal challenge to e-tolling by the Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (Outa) was dismissed by the Supreme Court of Appeal on October 9.

Outa announced on October 18 that it did not have enough money to continue the legal fight against e-tolling. Outa's argument remained that Sanral and government did not conduct a proper public participation process.

Maimane said the DA application differed from the Outa application because it was about the tagging of the bill.


Source : Sapa /dm/hdw/cls/jk
Date : 07 Nov 2013 13:19
 
Interesting. It does however pose a point of contention though if they're intending to argue for a levy-based recovery mechanism, as their application centres around the project being of provincial importance over national importance. Hmmm...
 
DJ... said:
Interesting. It does however pose a point of contention though if they're intending to argue for a levy-based recovery mechanism, as their application centres around the project being of provincial importance over national importance. Hmmm...
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Easy enough, they will fall back on the old argument of Gauteng Economy benefits the national economy.
 
Garyvdh said:
Easy enough, they will fall back on the old argument of Gauteng Economy benefits the national economy.
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That and the fact that there is already a regional difference in fuel price, so there's no reason a levy can't be provincial based.
THen again, saNral... NATIONAL roads. Simple.
 
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