SPAD needs time, CEO says in response to AG Report
(The Star) – A young age and lack of manpower were some of the reasons that the Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD) believed led to the Auditor-General’s criticism that it only focused on express buses.
SPAD chief executive Mohd Nur Ismal Mohamed Kamal said the commission focused on these buses soon after it was formed in 2011 as they posed the highest risk to public transport users.
“(SPAD) focused on this particular public transport mode because historically, express buses were the public transport mode with the highest risk to passengers,” he said in a statement.
He was referring to the Auditor-General’s Report Series 2, which said that SPAD did not complete its safety compliance auditing of land public transport and commercial vehicles in 2011 and 2012.
Mohd Nur said that when SPAD was audited by the Auditor-General in 2011, the commission only had 62 enforcement agents on staff, adding that it came into being on Jan 31 2011.
He said SPAD had yet to set up safety audits at the time, and those was pushed through via its Industry Code of Practice Safety Health and Environment (ICOP SHE) in Aug 2013.
This form of auditing started with express buses that month and moved on to freight vehicles in Oct 2013.
It was added that the ICOP SHE will soon become license conditions for school bus operators in H2 2014.
The Auditor-General also pointed out that SPAD failed to collect RM868,798 or 31% of the total compounds issued in 2011.
To this, Mohd Nur said all outstanding compounds from cases not settled within 90 days are registered for court action.
“Unfortunately the problem is misclassified as uncollected due to SPAD’s outdated legacy IT system,” he said.
He added that SPAD embarked on the development of a new system called SPAD Operator Licensing System (SPOLS) which would allow the status of compounds to be tracked better.
It is poised to replace its currently used SIKAP system by Sept 2015.
In a response to the Auditor-General’s recommendation that SPAD work with other agencies, Mohd Nur said it already did so, and carried out joint operations with them.
