Road transport, by its very nature, is mobile and cannot be confined to the borders of Quebec. In this context, it is entirely natural that the legislator has provided, under the Act respecting owners, operators and drivers of heavy vehicles, that the Société de l'assurance automobile du Québec (hereafter “SAAQ”) must take into account certain events occurring in other Canadian jurisdictions to identify owners, operators, and drivers of heavy vehicles (hereafter “PECVL”) who pose a risk to road safety and the protection of the road network.
What is less natural, however, is the way it proceeds.
The Policy for Evaluating the Behavior of Owners and Operators of Heavy Vehicles explains how the SAAQ handles this:
" 5.1.3.5 Events Occurring in Other Canadian Jurisdictions
Events (infractions, accidents, major mechanical defects, driver-related out-of-service orders) occurring in other Canadian jurisdictions involving a heavy vehicle registered in Quebec are recorded as transmitted by those jurisdictions and as noted by peace officers from those jurisdictions in the PECVL’s file.
Furthermore, these events are taken into account in evaluating the PECVL’s behavior according to the provisions of the Policy.
A PECVL wishing to correct an infraction notice, accident report, mechanical inspection certificate, or any other document issued by another Canadian jurisdiction must request the correction from the issuing jurisdiction.
An appendix presents equivalency codes established by the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators (CCMTA) for infractions and the associated weighting applied to them in Quebec."
It must be understood that the SAAQ refuses to analyze each event occurring in another jurisdiction through the lens of Quebec legislation, but is happy to apply weighting to the PECVL’s file.
For example, a defect that would not result in an out-of-service order in Quebec may still be weighted as such if it occurs in Alberta and, under Alberta regulations, qualifies as an out-of-service condition.
When it comes to infractions committed in other Canadian jurisdictions, things get more complicated and the process becomes opaque.
To determine that Infraction A in Manitoba is equivalent to Infraction B in Quebec—and thus that a weighting of x points applies to the PECVL’s file—the SAAQ uses and applies an equivalency table from the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators (CCMTA), of which it is a member.
In practice, each Canadian province associates its infractions with a description linked to a generic code. For example, “exceeding the speed limit by 31 to 40 km/h” corresponds to code 8. Since each province identifies which legal article corresponds to this speeding violation (code 8), it becomes easy to correlate the infraction committed in another jurisdiction with the corresponding infraction in Quebec.
Thus, by simply receiving this code, the SAAQ can apply the weighting as if the infraction had occurred in Quebec. Following a conviction for an infraction in another province, the event will appear in the PECVL’s file with the equivalency code.
Although the SAAQ now provides the list of CCMTA codes with their descriptions and weightings in Quebec, since we do not have access to the rest of the concordance table—allowing us to link, for example, Infraction A in Manitoba to CCMTA code 8—we are unable to perform the correlation ourselves.
This is where the problem lies, because for a PECVL, the motivation to plead not guilty to an infraction notice stems much more from the impact of the event on their file than from the fine amount or, for a CVL, the number of demerit points attached to it.
My colleagues and I are often asked by clients to determine whether an infraction committed in another Canadian jurisdiction will have repercussions on their file.
Currently, we are unable to advise with 100% accuracy what the impact will be, because the SAAQ and CCMTA refuse to provide a simple concordance table.
The SAAQ is either unaware of the paradox it imposes or particularly cynical when it claims that “It is the responsibility of PECVLs to periodically check the status of their file to be informed of the events recorded therein and to request a correction if necessary.”
How can one seriously impose on a citizen the obligation to determine for themselves whether the penalizing entity has made an error, without providing the necessary tools to do so?
Only the SAAQ has the answer to this question. Let’s hope that one day it will ask itself that question.
This publication was featured in Transport Magazine.
