Increase in Road deaths as Government break commitments to road safety

[Iarmhi Gael]

Some interesting points from FG today.

18 people dead on roads in May


The surge in road deaths is a direct result of the Government’s loss of interest in the road safety agenda, Fine Gael Transport Spokesman Fergus O’Dowd TD has warned, adding that 18 people have already died this month.

Deputy O’Dowd was speaking after Road Safety Authority Chairman Gay Byrne slammed the Government’s decision to axe its publicity campaign.

“The Fianna Fáil Government has lost all interest in road safety and all the good work of recent years is being lost. Ninety eight people have already died this year, just two short of last year’s total for the same period. And a litany of Government commitments on road safety have been broken:

• Speed cameras have still not been rolled out across the country because of a row between the Departments of Justice and Finance over funding;
• Garda Traffic Corps overtime is being cut back, meaning they spend less time on traffic duties;
• The district court system is already struggling to cope with traffic offences, and is in danger of collapsing if the speed cameras are ever rolled out;
• Mandatory alcohol testing at accident scenes has still not been implemented;
• And the budget for local and regional local roads has been slashed by 29%.

“The current Road Safety Strategy is nothing but a work of fantasy. Target dates are repeatedly ignored and key measures never see the light of day.

“Bad driving is a key factor in the recent surge in road deaths. But there is no excuse for bad Government when lives are at stake.”

[Dylan]

lets face it the government has used road safety as a cloak for generating revenue. They have no interest in saving peoples lives. I know, lets put some more coppers on the motorways to catch people doing 125Kmh - we all know thats where the majority of accidents happen right?

Also lets get a new face of Irish road safety ... perhaps we can replace gaybo with Pat Kenny, he is about as obvious a choice as Gay was *shakes head*

[20000miles]

The above are all proximate causes of road deaths. The root cause is poor management of roads by those who have no profit incentive to ensure they are well maintained. The ultimate solution is to hand over the roads to private hands, and to allow them to make the necessary changes to facilitate safer roads.

[MsAnneThrope]

No number of safer roads, or any privatisation of our roads, will have any significant impact if the blatant drink/drug driving continues. Anybody living in the countryside will know what I'm talking about. It is still rampant.

For example, go to any rural pub after late morning or midday mass on a Sunday and count the number of cars there. They're not in there drinking Ballygowan. Now go back at 5 or 6pm, or even closing time (which in some of these pubs can be up to 4 or 5 a.m. at which stage some of local gardai are also in knocking back pints) and you'll see the same cars there. With maybe one or two exceptions all the cars will be gone if you're passing it at 8 a.m. next morning. This carry on is the norm, albeit on a smaller scale Monday to Wednesday, every week. From Thursday onwards to Sunday it's worse.

Pass by any rural pub that has a beer garden on a sunny day and you'll see cars galore and people knocking back pints all day in the sun and driving home afterwards, frequently with small children in the car.

A few, but it's very few, will get a spouse or relative or friend to drive their car and them home afterwards but most just hop in themselves. Out of their heads. I see it every weekend with the exception of around Christmas and bank holiday weekends when the Gardai announce their "crackdowns".

They should do random crackdowns on normal weekends, covering all the smaller roads from the target pub, and in my area alone they'll catch dozens, guaranteed, within a couple of hours until the word spreads and people abandon their cars.

But what examples are the local guards setting when they are frequently on the premises, outside licensing hours, hammered drunk (or certainly well over the limit) and driving home themselves?

It follows the publication of recent statistics by the HSE on drink driving in Ireland which found that 1 in 3 crashes between 2003 and 2005 were alcohol related. Furthermore, where blood alcohol levels were available for killed drivers, almost 6 out of 10 (58%) had alcohol in their blood

Source: RSA

Add to this all the unlit cyclists and pedestrians in dark clothes on the roads at night (a hazard to even sober drivers) and the modern day scourge - drivers on drugs - and the situation is even worse. You'll never see a serious reduction in our road deaths until these issues are tackled.

We can't all blame the Government for this carry on. And I'm sure everyone reading this knows of at least one person who drink drives weekly.

[Middleaged]

We travelled from just outside Dublin to Cork last saturday, not one guard seen, Cork to Waterford, Waterford to Home on Sunday not one guard seen.

That's almost 500kms of driving, with not on stop to verify anything.