Mr. John Farrell:

I thank the Chairman and members for giving us the opportunity to address them today and to present our proposal regarding changing driver behaviour to improve road safety.

My name is John Farrell and I have been involved in the transport industry since 1990 as a driver and transport manager in both bus and truck operations. I am here with my colleague, Yvonne Kinnarney, ADI, chartered member of the Institute of Logistics and Transport and lecturer in the areas of transport management, ADR, ADI and driver CPC.

We have put together a proposal that will both enhance road safety and contribute to reducing road fatalities. The penalty points system for driving offences was introduced in Ireland on 31 October 2002 to improve driver behaviour in Ireland using penalty points as a deterrent and as a means to reduce the levels of death and serious injury on our roads. While this system has had a major impact on driving behaviour, drivers themselves continue to offend and our proposal is aimed at developing further the idea of having re-education, together with prosecution, as a deterrent for driving offences. With the increase in road deaths of 16% from 2015 to 2016, we feel that further development is required to reduce and reverse this trend.

From the age of 17 and after acquiring a full driver's licence, a driver is not obliged to undergo any further training or certification on their licence unless it is for professional development or for medical reasons. Technically, a driver can continue to drive through a 53-year period without being reviewed or monitored on their traits and behaviour. Our proposal operates on two levels. As of 31 January last, there were 61,572 drivers with six or more penalty points on their licences and we would like to focus on them initially. Level 1 is classroom-based training and re-education of drivers who have acquired penalty points on their licence. The classroom-based training will examine salient points on road safety such as the impact of speeding, mobile phone usage, driver fatigue, intoxicants and the duty of care to other road users. We will show how the offences contribute towards road traffic collisions and the potential impact on other road users. It is an important reminder that, when we speak about road safety, we are not talking about faceless statistics but real people. Every day we read about people who have died on our roads. There are also those who survive these collisions and who have to live with life-changing injuries. These people have to learn to cope with their injuries. Their families, friends and loved ones are also learning how to support them every day.

We will also use audiovisual examples and a participants' manual in training. There will be a written examination with multiple choice questions to show the level of participation and understanding of the modules covered. We envisage, on completion of training, that participants' attendance will be uploaded via a secure portal to the RSA where, after a monitoring period, they will be permitted to reduce their endorsements by two penalty points.

This brings me to level 2- the monitoring. Driver's behaviour will be monitored through a smartphone application that will generate reports for the driver and the monitoring centre. This report produces analysis of acceleration, braking, cornering and speed, ABCS for short. During the class the application will be downloaded and presented to the participant, all details of the report will be explored and explained and participants will be shown how driver behaviour can contribute towards improved road safety. International studies have shown that in-vehicle monitoring can help employers and at-work drivers to reduce their crash rates when driving for work. Some studies have found that accident rates for vehicles fitted with a monitoring device reduced by 20%, while others found a reduction of 38% in collisions and the rate of specific unsafe driving behaviours was reduced by up to 82% in one case.

The most prominent issue that emerges from the research is the importance of feedback about the driving behaviour monitored by the technology. Feedback is designed to raise awareness of the real way someone is driving and to highlight particular types of driving behaviour that may increase risk. Many of the research studies that examine the role of feedback have found that simply providing access to feedback about a driver's behaviour is not enough to ensure that the driver views and considers it. In order to obtain the best safety benefits from in-vehicle monitoring technology, it is important to deliver feedback mechanisms that encourage drivers and other relevant people to view and use the feedback and, in so doing, improve their behaviour.

To summarise, it is a classroom-based refresher course for fully licensed drivers with penalty points. The application is downloaded to a smartphone. There is regular feedback for the driver to show quality of driving and to reward improvement. There is a penalty point credit for completion and proof of behavioural changes. Finally, there is monitoring by the RSA.

The statistics of the cohort should be also made available for monitoring and research. By monitoring we can show that we can modify, in a positive way, the behaviour of the driver to reduce the frequency and severity of collisions.

Again, we would like to thank the committee for the opportunity to present this proposal and will be happy to answer any questions members may wish to pose.