With Transport Minister Anthony Loke conceding that "runners" and cartels are getting defective vehicles passed at Puspakom, the time is ripe to rethink the privatisation of vehicle inspections.
There was another menacing disclosure by the minister: the likelihood of "external pressure" on the Road Transport Department's enforcement activities.
He didn't specify whether it was political pressure or otherwise, but either way, such threats must be nipped in the bud. It is true that the RTD must enforce the law without fear or favour because human lives are at stake, but the ministry must ensure that no one stands in its way.
Defective vehicles being put on the road isn't going to go away by bringing in new vehicle inspection operators. Vehicle inspection is a government function and should revert to RTD.
Right now, there is a duplication of vehicle inspection aplenty between Puspakom and RTD. It would only get worse with more concessionaires entering the market.
Talk about crowding out government functions. It is erroneous to think that more competition in the vehicle inspection market will do away with the need for RTD to conduct inspections.
Look at how inefficient our highway concessionaires have become. One or 30, the story is the same. What is worse, more operators mean more opportunity for "runners" and cartels to grow, as anti-crime groups pointed out to this newspaper on Friday.
Obviously there are certain areas of government function that may lend itself to privatisation, but here, too, Putrajaya must tread with caution.
There is a false premise that the private sector is always more efficient than the public sector. Not true. Call it a carry over of the 1980s Anglo-American privatisation creed. If not the United States, at least Britain is taking back some public services that it privatised under Margaret Thatcher.
The rail services and some government franchises are glaring examples. Britain learned the hard way: it retracted after privatisation failed in a big way to deliver services to the public. There is a cheaper lesson to be learned for us here: don't repeat the mistakes of others.
Like national security, public safety must never be privatised. Some think the link between public safety and vehicle inspection is at best tenuous. They can't be more wrong.
Just consider the 1,457 lives lost in road crashes involving lorries between January 2019 and November 2024, the link isn't that tenuous. Sure, not all the fatalities were due to "defective" lorries being put on the road, but some surely were.
The cynics among us would say that returning vehicle inspection to the RTD would only encourage more "runners" and cartels.
Let's be blunt, the private sector isn't that innocent. Yes, there is corruption in public service, but do we hive off the policing function to concessionaires? Or national security? Or border control?
Certainly not. We grant that certain countries like the US and UK have privatised some prisons, but it has only served the interests of the rich, with wealthy criminal gangs turning their cells into Ritz-Carlton-like rooms.
Profit motive at times makes crime pay. Money must not be allowed to buy everything. Like everything in life, competition has its limits.