Road deaths - Urgent need to beef up traffic corps

Now that Frances Fitzgerald appears to have settled comfortably into her role as minister for justice, perhaps she might show more enthusiasm than her predecessor for increasing the number of Garda patrols on our roads.

It does not take a statistician to see that Garda manpower has been stretched beyond endurance and that, as a consequence, there are fewer patrols not only on the streets of our towns and cities but also on the roads.

The result is worrying and horrifying. After years of tremendous work by gardaí and the Road Safety Authority in reducing the appalling loss of life on our roads, the number of people killed in car accidents has risen again.

This weekend alone, five people have died in crashes, among them an 84-year-old man and a 10-year-old girl. She was killed along with three women in Co Westmeath after the car in which they were travelling collided with a 4x4.

It is particularly harrowing to see the ending of lives that have barely begun. So far this year, seven children have died on Irish roads. Seven too many.

According to the European Commission, 2013 was the second year in a row that saw a significant drop in the number of people killed on Europe’s roads. In contrast here, deaths rose for the first time in eight years — and that upward trend is continuing. There was a 17% increase last year in road deaths over 2012, following years of decline.

Ireland also has the highest level of fatalities among women drivers in the EU, accounting for almost a quarter of such deaths in Ireland between 2010 and 2012 — twice the EU average. As well as that, we have above-average levels of fatal head-on collisions.

These are grim figures, indeed, but it must not be forgotten that behind every statistic there is a real person, and when sudden death occurs, great heartache for the loved ones left behind.

It is worth noting the words of Gay Byrne, who has decided to retire as chairman of the Road Safety Authority. According to him, we in Ireland have “dropped our guard” when it comes to road deaths.

A year and a half ago, he wrote to the then justice minister Alan Shatter, telling him Garda enforcement levels were of “significant concern” to the authority, as the numbers being killed on the roads had increased. “In the absence of high-visibility, high-volume roads policing, road-user behaviour will continue to deteriorate and result in further loss of life and serious injuries,” Mr Byrne said in the letter.

In a stinging rebuke, Mr Shatter rejected the argument and accused him of employing “completely wrong logic” in his assertions.

Yet it is hard to argue with the logic that the reduction by a quarter in the Garda Traffic Corps must mean fewer patrols. Equally, a growing perception that the likelihood of encountering Garda traffic enforcement units is remote, is bound to lead to drivers becoming complacent and careless.

The best year in 50 years for road safety was 2012, but deaths rose again in 2013 and so far this year, we are ahead of last year’s figures. If that trend continues, the progress that has been made over the last eight years will be lost — and, with it, more and more lives.