Mr. Se?n Fallon:

Senator Ruane touched on education and that is a hugely important piece for us, certainly in terms of the engagement we have had recently with our roads policing personnel. We have proactively examined in the past six to nine months how we would engage with those target demographics of people who may be at risk. During that we came upon a really interesting piece. I want to reassure the committee that there are really passionate people in the roads policing community; their professionalism comes across the table when they speak with great passion about going to those scenes and dealing with the horrific aftermaths that they face on a fairly frequent basis. One of the sergeants in Limerick developed the Lifesaver educational project. Last week we agreed that would be rolled out nationally as part of our education programme where we will have a standardised presentation that can be adapted. Its initial concept was to target transition year students across Limerick but that can be tailored and adapted to industry and Tony has given this presentation to various large companies in the Limerick area.

We did some feedback touching on the impact that is having. The data we received were a very positive endorsement of that, particularly around getting the voice into those young people, as it were, because they are probably not watching TV. In my own house nobody watches TV and we are not reading mainstream newspaper media. How are we going to target that? It is tailor made and the advantage for us that we are really excited about is that it will be standardised and we will have lifesaver project ambassadors. For all the pain points we are seeing, there is the opportunity to raise awareness of that. There is a reality, as was alluded to, that at certain times you do not realise the damage you are causing. There is an onus on us not just in terms of the enforcement piece but the education piece and bringing people with us because, as the Commissioner has alluded to, this is very much a shared responsibility. It will not all be done by gardaí alone. Likewise, everyone has a social responsibility. Certainly in terms of the education piece, we are quite excited by it and think it will have a real impact. It has had so far and it has been delivered the project to something in the region of 50,000 people. We are quite enthused by that.