Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)

I commend Deputy Shortall and my colleagues in Fine Gael, Deputy Mitchell and others, for tabling this important motion. I am a member of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Enterprise and Small Business. That committee embarked on a study of road safety as an ancillary project to the work it was undertaking on insurance costs in the State. Although the committee began from an economic perspective, the shocking information that was presented to it made it examine the human and social aspects of this issue. While we can quantify, in monetary terms, the impact on the State of the multiplicity of road accidents, deaths and injuries, the human tragedy that befalls individual families, weekend after weekend in the appalling litany of carnage that we have become accustomed to, demands a single-minded and determined focus from this House and all agencies of the State.

There are a number of important issues in this debate. Compelling evidence was presented to the Oireachtas Joint Committees on Enterprise and Small Business and on Transport, by representatives of the Garda Síochána and the National Safety Council in recent weeks. The National Safety Council told the committees that if the level of deaths here was the same per 100,000 of population as in Sweden, Holland and the UK, on average 20 people fewer per month would die. That is an extraordinary statistic. If we were given a formula to save 20 lives every month, if we were to build an extra hospital or institution to do so, would we not vote it through tomorrow? The council went on to argue:

. . . from where we are today, we could prevent 140 deaths and approximately 1,200 serious injuries every year. This is achievable.

Not only is it achievable, it must be achieved. If we have any conscience in this House, we cannot be indifferent to that plain statement of fact from the people we have asked to look at safety in this State.

The traffic corps is an important issue in this debate. The first report of the Joint Committee on Enterprise and Small Business recommended a traffic corps. That was endorsed in the manifestos of all political parties in the last election, but what is the situation with the traffic corps? How many new members will it have this year? The answer given to the committee by the deputy commissioner was 33. There will be 33 additional personnel for the whole of Ireland in 2005, which will bring the total complement to less than half the promised strength of 1,200, which in itself is hardly an excessive figure. We are crawling to achieve——

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