Parents of boy, 4, killed by drunk driver call for road safety to be part of school curriculum

(Left to right) Dr Christina O'Connor, Associate Professor in Marketing at UL, winning students Saoirse Smith, Elizabeth Imole and Victory Omorodiom with Sergeant Tony Miniter, Limerick Roads Policing at a new road safety initiative led by University of Limerick and An Garda Siochana to highlight the dangers of drug-driving. Picture: Arthur Ellis

The parents of a four-year-old boy killed by a drunk driver have called for drivers' education and road safety to be part of the secondary and primary school education curriculums to help tackle the scourge of road deaths.

On the eve of the tenth anniversary of the death of their son Ciarán, Gillian and Ronan Treacy said road safety and responsible driving should be taught and encouraged in schools from an early age.

“Young people are the demographic we are targeting with this message, they are the ones that are heading out on the roads and if you catch them young, it will sow a positive seed in them and hopefully carry it through their driving life,” said Ronan Treacy.

Gillian Treacy, who was seriously injured in the collision which claimed Ciarán’s life, said a combination of theory and practical road safety and driver training should be taught in schools: “There definitely should be both. It is one thing knowing the theory but putting it into practice is another thing.” 

Ms Treacy said their eldest son, Sean, who turns 18 this year, and who was traveling with his mother and brother Ciarán when the fatal collision occurred “is going to be thinking about driving soon, so it is a huge worry for us after everything that happened in our house”.

“All we can do is instill a little bit of sense into him, and remind him that it’s not just about him and us, it’s about other road users, and not to bring that heartache on another family,” added Ms Treacy, who for the past six years was a board director at the Road Safety Authority (RSA).

“We really want to make it a part of everyday thinking that drink-driving, drug-driving is completely unacceptable."

The couple from Portarlington, Co Laois, who fronted the RSA’s ‘Crashed Lives’ television advertising campaign in 2016, were on Tuesday honoured with the Oisín Crotty Road Safety Award 2024 at University of Limerick (UL), led by An Garda Siochana, the University, and funded by ESB.

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After presenting the Treacys with the award, Sean Crotty, whose 19-year-old son and ESB apprentice Oisín Crotty, from Ballynunnery Co Kilkenny, lost his life in a road collision in 2013, said: “I wanted to be here on behalf of Oisin to support his memory and to do what I could with getting a message out about road safety.” 

At Tuesday’s event, students from UL, South East Technological University (SETU), Maynooth University (MU), showcased road safety projects which they designed to hit home the dangers posed by drug-driving.

The winning design from MU, which will be used as part of a Garda road-safety campaign, involved the image of a dice entitled, ‘Chances of you getting home safe aren’t as high as you are’, to stress the unpredictability of drug-driving.

To date in 2024, there have been 63 people killed in crashes on the country's roads, 14 more than in the same period in 2023. Gardaí say 30% of victims in the first three months of this year were aged 16-25.

“Drink-driving, drug-driving and speeding continue to be among the primary causes of serious collisions,” added a spokesperson.