ROAD ACCIDENT FUND ACT AMENDMENTS ‘AT AN ADVANCED STAGE’

ROAD ACCIDENT FUND ACT AMENDMENTS ‘AT AN ADVANCED STAGE’

• 22 April 2024
• Transport
• SA Legal Academy

Legislative amendments to the Road Accident Fund Act, 1996, are ‘at an advanced stage’. This is according to a belated media statement on Cabinet’s ‘special’ 10 April 2024 meeting. To be ‘considered by the 7th administration of government’ and its Parliament, the Road Accident Fund Amendment Bill apparently focuses on:

• ‘refining’ benefits
• paying certain future loss of income benefits by way of annuities, and
• equitability.

The Bill was released in draft form in September 2023 for public comment, as SA Legal Academy reported at the time.

Equitability was one of the issues underpinning a Road Accident Benefit Scheme Bill tabled in Parliament in June 2017 and rejected by the National Assembly nearly three years later. The Bill sought to provide for ‘a scheme of structured and defined benefits’ underpinned by ‘social insurance principles’, as opposed to the prevailing compensation system’s ‘liability insurance principles’. The House’s decision to reject the Bill was prompted by a brief report from its Transport Committee at the time, among other things noting that amendments to the Road Accident Fund Act might be ‘more prudent’ in the circumstances (Parliamentary Monitoring Group/PMG).

• Cabinet media statement
• draft Bill
• August 2020 committee report on the rejected Road Accident Benefit Scheme Bill, 2017 (PMG)

Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch

Follow us on X @SALegalAcademy (you can also join us on LinkedIn and Facebook)

0 COMMENTS

LEAVE A COMMENT