Ireland performs badly on enforcing drink driving laws

THE Government’s record of enforcing drink driving legislation has been strongly criticised in a major new report by the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC).

Ireland was ranked 13th overall out of the 25 EU member states on their performance in enforcing road safety legislation.

The report also showed that Ireland has the eighth best road safety record in terms of death per million inhabitants.

The ETSC, a non-profit Brussels-based road safety organisation, recommended that Ireland had a lot more to do in relation to drink driving legislation to achieve best practice by EU standards.

However, the report also recognised that Ireland has made improvements in recent years in tackling speeding and improving seat belt wearing through greater enforcement levels.

Finland emerged as the EU country with the best overall record, followed by Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and Britain. Finland and Sweden were recognised for testing “alcolocks” — a new device fitted to vehicles which prevents drivers over the legal alcohol limit from starting a car’s ignition.

At the other end of the scale, Poland was rated the country with the worst road safety enforcement levels, followed by Spain and Cyprus.

The ETSC has recommended a number of further measures to improve enforcement levels in Ireland which include:

*The introduction of random breath testing

*The extension of the penalty points system to include more offences

*An increase in the number of fixed speeding cameras

*The assignment of more officers to the Garda Traffic Corps to increase the number of drink-driving checks on motorists.

Meanwhile, a 46-year-old man died in a two-car collision in Co Fermanagh on Monday night. The crash happened on the main Enniskillen-Irvinestown road just after 10.30pm. Four other people were injured.