'Drug-driving a particular concern' as minister admits road deaths could top 200

Road Safety Minister Jack Chambers said driver behaviour is “getting worse” and that more than 200 people could be killed in crashes this year. File photo Sasko Lazarov / © RollingNews.ie

The Government has admitted that at least 40 more people could die on the roads in 2024 than last year.

Road Safety Minister Jack Chambers said driver behaviour is “getting worse” and that more than 200 people could be killed in crashes this year.

In the first three months of 2024, 54 lives have been lost, the most recent of which was a woman and two young children in Mayo when their car collided with a lorry on the N17.

At the Road Safety Authority’s Easter Appeal, Mr Chambers said it had been a “terrible” start to the year to back up a record-breaking 183 deaths on Irish roads in 2023.

“We’ve seen a 25% increase in road fatalities on the back of a terrible year last year,” he said. "At the moment, based on current trends, we are heading for upwards of over 40 more people killed on our roads in 2024 — which would be over well over 200 people. That would reverse 10 years of significant progress.” 

Last year, for the same Easter period, five people were killed on the roads.

Mr Chambers said: “That is a terrible loss of life to five families. Families who don’t have that person for Easter this year because they lost their lives last year."

Both the RSA and the minister noted that things had taken a sharp spike in the wrong direction after the covid lockdowns. Drug-driving, in particular, is a concern.

Mr Chambers said: “(Drug-driving) is absolutely getting worse. There is a very worrying, increased trend of drug-driving that we're seeing with the checkpoints that are occurring that's being flagged by the RSA to us.

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“That’s a very serious trend that I think is feeding into (the overall issue of road safety). People who are under the influence of any substance — that increases the likelihood of speeding, distracted driving and putting them at risk of a serious collision or fatality — drug-driving is absolutely playing a very worrying role in all of this.”

Assisstant Garda Commissioner Paula Hilman said her officers are arresting one person every hour for drink- or drug-driving and issuing two tickets every hour for driving while using a mobile phone. Four people are stopped by gardaí every hour for speeding and the safety cameras detect 10 speeding each hour.

The husband of the mother who died with her two daughters in the tragic road crash in Mayo is rushing back to Ireland from Ethiopia where he had been working as a project manager. The couple and their family had been living in Moycullen in Galway.

The car in which the family members died collided with an articulated lorry on the N17 Galway to Sligo road near Claremorris.