WESTERN CAPE NEWS - The Western Cape Department of Transport and Public Works is calling for public input into its proposal to introduce a new provincial vehicle licence mark, WC, that will be applicable to all registering authorities in the province.
According to a notice published in the Provincial Gazette on Friday 15 November, a period of five years will be allowed for all vehicles registered in the Western Cape to switch to the new licence mark.
It will contain two letters, two figures and two letters in any sequence, followed by the WC licence mark. The deadline for the switch-over is 31 January 2025.
The WC mark will also replace the new interim CAG licence mark for George which the George Municipality will start issuing in the next month or so when all CAW combinations that can be legally fitted onto a number plate runs out.
According to a statement from the department, multiple licence marks allocated to one registering authority (such as Cape Town with the CA, CAA, CEY, CF, CFM, CFR and CY licence marks) sometimes leads to the manipulation of address information on NaTIS (National Traffic Information System) where a vehicle owner favours a particular licence mark of another area over his / her local licence mark.
Also, more than one municipality share the same licence mark, such as the municipalities of Theewaterskloof and Overstrand that share the CAM licence mark, according to Jandré Bakker, head of communications.
"Furthermore, the current municipal areas do not in all respects align with the areas of the former Department of Inland Revenue through which licence marks were originally established and allocated. This leads to a vehicle being allocated with a licence number that contains a licence mark, as programmed on NaTIS, at a registering authority that is not part of the local municipality of the vehicle owner - a situation where revenue through vehicle licence fees is then not paid to the correct municipality," he says.
Increase in licence fees
A notice was also gazetted on Friday regarding an average increase of 4,5% in vehicle licence fees.
Comment regarding the above two proposals may be submitted in writing before or on 13 December 2019. Post comments to Mr Shaldon le Roux, Assistant Director: Traffic Legislative Matters, PO Box 2603, Cape Town, 8000, or e-mail them to Shaldon.LeRoux@westerncape.gov.za.
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