Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I express my admiration for Roseann and Chris Brennan, their family and supporters whom I met for the first time today. I was very impressed by their determination when I recently saw them on television. They have been protesting outside Leinster House since Sunday, only eight short months after Jake’s unfortunate death. That alone indicates their determination. When I spoke to them this morning, I was impressed again by their determination to ensure steps are taken to address the issue of speed limits in housing estates and to lessen the possibility of similar tragedies occurring in the future. I acknowledge that the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government and the Taoiseach have met with the Brennan family. Hopefully, this will be followed up by allowing this Bill not just to go forward to Committee Stage but to be actually passed by the Dáil and Seanad and enacted.

Ramps and other traffic-calming measures such as build-outs, in use in many housing estates, are effective but only part of the solution. Build-outs have been installed in many estates such as Ard Erin in Mountrath, County Laois, and in Cois Na hAbhainn, Portlaoise, County Laois. While they assist traffic calming, some drivers just wait for the opportunity to put the foot down again and speed off when they get past them.

The number of deaths of young children in housing estates as a result of road accidents is unacceptable. In Portlaoise alone, in the past several years, two children have been killed as a result of traffic accidents in housing estates. While people must drive through housing estates, it must be remembered they are also play areas for children. While we cannot make these 100% safe, there is more we can do. Most of all, we must develop and foster a culture of driver responsibility and road safety with particular emphasis on driving safely in housing estates.

Roseann and Christopher Brennan told me today that they are anxious to change people’s attitudes towards speeding, particularly in residential areas. It must be made totally unacceptable for people to speed in housing estates. Several decades ago drink-driving was socially acceptable. It is not now. The same must happen with speeding in residential areas and everywhere. This Bill will put further responsibility on drivers, helping create and foster a change of attitudes about which Roseann and Christopher Brennan spoke to me.

I, along with local Sinn Féin representatives in Laoighis-Offaly, have been demanding the introduction of 20 km/h speed limits in residential areas for a long time but the local authorities oppose this with claims the lowest limit one can go to is 30 km/h.

We must change that. We must enable councils and councillors to have that as a reserve function, particularly where children are playing because that is not sufficient. The whole issue of blanket speed limits is not logical. At the moment, there is a review coming up, of which the Minister is aware, across the local authorities where the blanket 80 km/h speed limits were put on all rural roads. They are all now being reviewed and changed, because they can be seen on very good roads and on boreens that are only about three metres wide. If we can change it on those roads, we can change it for housing estates.

We must have the speed limit to fit the road. The speed limit has to reflect the roads in the area, but also other factors such as housing density and the proximity and location of play areas. There is a situation in Kilberry, near Athy in County Kildare, where Bord na Móna lorries go up and down right by the play area in the housing estates near the local Bord na Móna factory. People do not want to stop the lorries going up and down, but they do want to reduce the speed limit. The local councillors in that area need to have the law on their side and need to have the power to do this.

We need to be able to get away from the situation where we can just have blanket 50 km/h speed limits across the board in urban areas. The designation of residential areas for 20 km/h speed limits needs to be decided locally. As a former councillor, I stress - I know councillors have some say - that to change the speed limit locally, which I have tried many times, is a very hard battle to get through. The best-placed people to do it are local councillors. Our Bill would provide for that.

There are guidelines issued by the Minister's Department, which set out some of what needs to be done, but the Department must go further. Along with some of the physical measures I mentioned, such as build-outs and ramps, there must also be allowance for speed limits to be put in place to facilitate situations like this. The designation of housing estates - of what constitutes a residential area - needs to be done by local councillors and our Bill provides for that. It sets out that it is a reserve function under by-laws.

I ask all sides of the House to support the Bill. Like the previous speaker, Deputy Mary Lou McDonald, I ask that the Government gets behind this and does not just let it run into the sand and go to the committee and nothing else happens. It should do this and do it before June. It would be a very good legacy for this Dáil to have, to say that we brought in this Bill.

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