Editor,

RE: "Highway ethics, not hefty traffic police fines, is the key” (The New Times, February 9).

There is nothing mutually exclusive between imposing punitive financial measures to provide negative motivation against bad driver behavior and building motorists’ safety consciousness through constant awareness campaigns. The two are in fact most effective when implemented in tandem.

Just a question though: Does the Police have the authority to set the amounts of fines it imposes, or this power is exclusively reserved to our parliamentary representatives, with the Police only proposing through its line ministry, i.e. the Ministry of Justice?