Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all the words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:

"—notes that Ireland has improved its road safety standing in Europe according to a new report published by the European Transport Safety Council by climbing four places in the last year to become the 12th lowest country for road deaths per million population of the 29 EU countries surveyed;

acknowledges that the report shows that road deaths in Ireland have dropped by 11% since 2001;

notes that the downward trend in road deaths has continued in 2007 and recognises that in the 12 months since the introduction of mandatory alcohol testing there has been a 25% reduction in road deaths compared to the previous 12 months;

commends the Government on the sustained implementation of road safety measures such as the establishment of the Road Safety Authority, the roll-out of the Garda traffic corps, the introduction of mandatory alcohol testing, the doubling of penalties for drink driving offences, the computerisation of penalty points and the introduction of penalty points for mobile phone offences;

notes that the RSA has prepared and submitted to the Minister for Transport a new road safety strategy for the period 2007-2012 in order to further reduce road deaths and injuries;

acknowledges that the Garda authorities have issued directions to the effect that it is expected that all drivers involved in serious road traffic collisions are breath tested unless there are overriding medical circumstances; and

notes that the Department of Transport proposes to engage with the Office of the Attorney General to establish how the current legislation can be amended to achieve roadside testing of drivers involved in serious accidents subject to overriding medical circumstances."

While I am glad we are using Dáil time for a discussion on road safety, I am somewhat disappointed, albeit not surprised, that the Fine Gael Party has tabled a motion which attempts to make a party political football of the issue by using carefully selected and distorted statistics.

See this speech in context