Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

First, I thank Deputy Troy for his contribution and the research and work that he put into the amendment that he is putting forward.

The whole issue, and the difficulties that we have with it, were compounded the other day when I saw a report whereby somebody stated that upon the passing of this legislation what people can be sure of is that there will be a concentration of members of An Garda Síochána out early in the mornings seeing what sort of a result they will get from a more stringent and more concentrated effort at the early morning breath tests.

Deputy Troy rightly mentioned in his contribution that the result of this could impact on drivers who would be very marginally over the limit the morning after doing everything right. At the end of the day, all we are talking about here is fair play for drivers who try to do the right thing. Such drivers, who go out at night, perhaps seldom, maybe with their wife or whatever, do everything right. They get a taxi or make an arrangement. The following morning, they are on their way to work and all of a sudden find themselves falling foul of the new penalties that would be in place following the enactment of this Bill.

That is why I still have the same problems. When I last spoke on this I made it quite clear I do not blame the Minister for everything that has gone wrong in rural Ireland but I see this as doing nothing to help the situation. I acknowledge that other people have put forward different arguments in support of what the Minister is doing. In case the Minister thinks he is without his supporters, there are people out there, as well as politicians here, who agree with what the Minister is trying to do. It has to be acknowledged. The Minister has his supporters. Unfortunately, when it comes to what the Minister is proposing in this Bill, I do not support it. I do not support it on certain grounds. It is why I and others have tabled a number of amendments that we want to be included. We want it to be changed. That is why we will be going through this in great detail, as we would be expected to do. If we were not to do so, we would be neglectful in our duties. At the end of the day, we are charged to be here to represent people. There are two sides to this argument. We feel we are right and that the status quo, the way the system is at present and the penalties go far enough.

I am terribly sorry. I will not go into personal detail because it would not be the right thing to do. I am very sorry for some of those who have contacted me in recent days. I have heard from individuals who gave me what I would call harrowing accounts of life experiences they have had. That has to be acknowledged. Would I want to see that happening to anybody else? Obviously I would not. Do I think what the Minister is proposing here today will stop it? I do not. That is fundamentally where we have the disagreement.

It is not that I do not respect the people who contact me and what they told me. It would be wrong to say that. I am only a human being the same as they are. Any one of us can fall foul of events that happen day-to-day in our lives, such as accidents and different things. None of us is immune from that. When it happens to anybody, let it be someone we do not know. When people contact us and tell us their stories, it is obviously a harrowing thing to be told. Like other Members in the House, I have heard from people. I appreciate them taking the time to contact me and talk to me. I hope I did them the proper courtesy of listening. I am sure that by acknowledging what I was told they will realise I did listen.

They might ask why I am not changing my mind and why I do not support the Minister. I still fundamentally believe we cannot legislate for every accident. If we could there would never again be an accident. They changed the way cars are made to reduce deaths. They made crumple zones. When the Volvo car came out first it was supposed to be the safest car going because it had all these different devices to make it safer than every other car. Now every car has every type of modern contraption to try to protect and safeguard the occupant of the car.

At the end of the day does it completely reduce the number of people dying on our roads? It does not. Our roads have been improving including the surface of roads, their alignment and their entrances and exits. Everybody is trying to do their part. Our local authorities are playing their part in trying to reduce the deaths on our roads. Gardaí are playing their part. Sadly, we will still have people dying and being maimed on our roads. Can the Minister and the Government and we as legislators completely stop people from being hurt, maimed or, sadly, dying on our roads? We cannot. We never will. If this legislation is passed in its entirely without amendments and if the Minister gets his way completely, does it mean it will impact and reduce the numbers? Will we finish up at a stage where we would all love to be if we could be and that would be that people would no longer die on our roads? No we will not. I fully believe that. We will not, no matter what we do or what anybody does.

It is like farm accidents. Year in, year out, we have seen farm incidents becoming more prevalent and more common. Sadly, we have people being maimed and dying on our farms in an awful number. It has increased in recent years despite the good work of people in the IFA, the ICMSA, the health and safety regulatory authorities and everybody campaigning and trying to make people aware of accidents and incidents and how to prevent them. Have we reached a stage where people are not dying on our farms? We have not and we will not because we cannot legislate for every eventuality. We cannot legislate for every accident. We cannot ensure people will not die in their workplaces, on building sites or in factories. It is happening all the time and it will continue to happen. There is nothing we can do. If I thought this would make a big change and would help us to reach a situation where people would no longer die on our roads, of course people would have to look very closely at it but I am not convinced.

I am not infallible. I do not have a monopoly on being right but at the same time, like everything in life, in politics one has to make a decision and make up one's mind about what one thinks is right and what one thinks is wrong. I think this is fundamentally wrong. I do not think the Minister has thought it through enough. I do not think the officials who have worked with the Minister, and for whom I have nothing but the utmost respect, have thought it through. I really think people are losing sight of the argument here. People are reacting to a situation where, very sadly, young people are losing their lives on the roads.

What I have always said is that when the Minister looks at the problem he should look at it in its entirety. One of the things I could never understand - it is not the Minister's fault - is why previous Ministers did not look at this. When I refer to Ministers, I refer to those in the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport and also to former Ministers for Education and Skills. One of the most sure things young people are ever going to do when they are going to school is to finish up driving a motor car. How could one say that any youngster today going to a national or secondary school will not finish up in charge of a mechanically-propelled vehicle? We know they absolutely will. It would be fair to say 99.9% of them will do so.

What are we doing in the education system to prepare those people for that monumental task? We are doing nothing. We teach them every other subject. We teach them everything. We prepare them for every aspect of life and one of the most major important things I can think of is that they will be in charge of a mechanically-propelled vehicle, they will be able to drive at a considerably young age and will be on our roads. We are doing nothing to prepare them for that. I really cannot get my head around it. I would be supportive of the Minister if he was coming in here and the Minister for Education and Skills was alongside him and he was saying it was his opinion that on leaving national school and going into first year in the secondary schools it would be compulsory on the curriculum that every day or a number of times a week youngsters would be trained on the issue of road safety, what it means to be courteous to other drivers, what it means to be careful, to value their lives and to protect other people and then to engage them on the rules of the road.

The majority of our young people would not dream of drinking and driving, though we will always have exceptions to that and situations for which we cannot account. I can never get over why we have not been educating young people in our schools about the use of motor cars, and this is something I have spoken about before. If we did that it would be very useful in creating awareness.

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