Ms Verona Murphy:

The truth is that even if he did transfer his licence into an Irish licence it would not mean that his first language was English or that he could adequately understand the course in English. It is a very basic knowledge. The point is that this is the same all over Europe. At the height of our building boom we had drivers who did not have a word of English sit safe pass courses that were absolutely irrelevant because they did not understand a word. I would not like to have the 30% foreign national driver population in Ireland sitting CPC courses because I know that their English would not be good enough. This is not a problem on the roadside checks for gardaí. We cannot speak Italian, French or German when we travel the highways and byways of Europe. If one is wrong they are wrong, and the language does not matter. Road safety legislation must be met. Tachograph legislation is the same in all languages, and it is shown on a digital card. Whether one can speak the language of the officer looking at it or not is irrelevant.