A PV strike to break the federal government. Four Belgian police unions have appealed not to report certain offenses committed by motorists from this Thursday, December 15, to Sunday, January 15. The reason? The failure of negotiations to obtain salary increases and an extension of the “soft career” for police officers who retire at 58, a system that will end in 2023, summarizes the Belgian news site SudInfo.
Up to 160 million euros of lost profit
In this period of year-end celebrations, the idea remains to considerably reduce a significant windfall for Belgian public finances.
“According to the unions, about 500 million euros will go to the fund for state fines in this end-of-year period,” summarizes the RTBF. The only unknown: how long this movement will continue.
Vincent Gilles, president of one of the unions, the SLFP police, estimates that this could affect 30% of the expected income during this period of the year, that is, between 150 and 160 million euros of lost profits for the state coffers. Belgian.
“Not the Wild West”
The idea of this photovoltaic strike is not, however, to sow discord on the country’s roads, as this union representative reminded the Belgian television channel:
“We will not allow Belgium to become a Wild West in terms of roads, we will continue to do our job, but using our testing possibility more often in certain contexts.”
In summary, this PV strike will only refer to minor infractions, which do not cause any real danger to other road users, such as the lack of payment for parking. Another example, in a curve, the absence of an indicator with no one around can be the subject of a warning, but not necessarily a fine.
The offender “will be stopped, identified, controlled but perhaps not necessarily fined”, which will not be the case if the absence of an indicator endangers another road user.
“The same happens with the rest of the serious driving infractions: speeding, driving under the influence of alcohol, crossing red lights or denying priority, all these infractions will be sanctioned with a fine”, specifies the RTBF.
In case of failure of the new negotiations with the Belgian government, the police unions at the origin of this PV strike have already warned that they were willing to continue the movement until 2024.
Source: BFM TV
