Peter Fitzpatrick (Louth, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Some 152 people have been killed in crashes on Irish roads so far this year, an increase of 30% on this time last year. In addition, gardaí say they have recorded more than 900 serious injury traffic collisions up to the end of September. Every death is one too many. Although road fatalities are more likely to make headlines, the authority needs to highlight to motorists, and all road users, the life changing impact serious injuries can have. The cognitive and physical consequences serious injuries have for these patients are devastating and affect their day-to-day lives. Serious injuries affect not just the victim of the road traffic incident, they can also be life-changing for their families, their friends and their communities.

Under the road safety strategy, the Government and Garda are working together towards reversing the upward trend of road tragedies through a mix of enforcement and education. On enforcement, speed is the biggest contributing factor in road deaths in Ireland. An estimated 30% of fatal collisions are the result of speeding or inappropriate speed. Following an ongoing two-year review, proposals have been made to lower baseline speed limits on rural roads as well as national secondary roads and roads in built-up and residential areas, which would have a significant impact in reducing serious collisions. Based on the fact that there were 25 deaths in August alone, these speed reductions need to be fast-tracked as numbers of road deaths are rising by the week.

Road safety data show that bank holiday weekends have a higher level of road deaths and serious injuries linked to driving. Under the enforcement plans, motorists who commit traffic offences such as speeding or not wearing a seat belt on bank holiday weekends will face higher penalty points. Under the new Road Traffic Measures Bill 2023, powers would be granted to vary the number of penalty points during specific times when road safety risks are higher. This is a welcome initiative and will be in place for October and there will also be similar plans in place for Christmas and the New Year.

Other measures include a change to intoxicant testing rules whereby gardaí would be required to test for drugs at the scene of road collisions. We want to see people being safe on the road, driving within speed limits, not using mobile phone while driving, which is extremely dangerous - and not using drugs or alcohol while driving. Learning from our Australian counterparts, these initiatives have had a positive impact on driver behaviour.

More than a decade ago, the Road Safety Strategy 2013-2020 included an action to end the loophole that allows learner drivers to continuously renew their licence without having to sit a test. However, up to 30,000 people are on their third or subsequent provisional licence and have never sat a driving test. Even if they did book one, the current delay in getting a driving test is unacceptable. The number of people waiting for driver tests has increased by 61% in the last year. Poor workforce planning by the Government and the Road Safety Authority, RSA, is obstructing many young people. If we are committing to achieving vision zero, with no deaths or serious injuries on our roads by 2050, we must halve the number of deaths and serious injuries on our roads by the end of this decade. It is only through a robust testing service that we can have confidence that drivers have been trained and tested to the highest standards on how to handle a vehicle safely on our roads. Research indicates that there was a significant change in drivers’ attitudes and behaviours in relation to behavioural breaches during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now, with the number of road deaths rising, we are experiencing the impact of these attitudes and breaches. That is why the education facet of this plan is just as important as enforcement.

A new road safety programme is being introduced to secondary schools around the country. The Assistant Commissioner has stated that roads policing has the highest number of specialist roles allocated to it, with about a quarter of our road safety and road policing work also done by community policing teams. Yet, road policing numbers have been cut by a third. Will the proposed garda rota changes and proposed reduction of community policing numbers effect the implementation of this plan? On top of this, within programme C - road networks and road safety - investment was cut by 10% within this year’s budget, which is €150 million less than last year. How then is road safety and road policing a priority?

We must look at investment in the plan both in terms of adequate personnel to ensure enforcement and adequate investment in the education campaign. Significant funding increases will enable us to repair, strengthen and maintain a road safety campaign across the regions. Significant funding is also required in our road infrastructure to ensure they are suitable for intended purposes. Improving and maintaining our road network is essential to sustained development of local economies in rural Ireland. We need to commit resources to initiatives such as road repairs, road safety measures, community engagements, drainage improvements and climate change adaptation. The Government says it will invest in roads and road safety, yet decreased the amount for road safety in the budget.

When I was a child it was very common for us to play in front of our house. It was a very safe place because there were not too many cars on the road. We could all play football, rounders, chasing and all different types of games. But times have changed. Look at all the new estates and the numbers of houses and the space left to park a car. The Minister will know as well as I do that most of these houses will have two or maybe three cars. They are expected to park one in the drive and the other two on the road. For kids, elderly people and people in wheelchairs it is almost impossible to walk when you stay on the footpath which means people have to walk on the road which is very dangerous.

If people are lucky enough to have a green in their areas, the speed at which cars travel around estates is crazy. I am appealing to the Minister. I have spoken to my local authorities and I cannot get an answer. We need more speed ramps in the estates. We need to reduce speed. The only we can help is to slow down traffic. That would mean kids, elderly people and people with disabilities are safe in those areas.

I also refer to e-scooters. The number of people who have mentioned e-scooters is unreal. I am in my constituency office on Mondays and Fridays, and not a day goes by when people do not come in to complain about e-scooters. They are on the footpaths. It is absolutely crazy. You see them when you go for a walk. They think they have a God-given right to beep their horns, to tell you to move or to shout and roar at you. That is not acceptable. I have first-hand experience in Dundalk of going for a walk in the early morning with my wife. These scooters come along. The worst part is that they are on the footpaths with no lights in the morning time when it may be dark. Even at night-time, any number of e-scooters without lights are flying around the roads. The problem is that there does not seem to be any law enforcement. That is something the Department and the Department of Justice could work closely together on. It is only a matter of time before someone is killed. In Dundalk a few weeks ago, a young person was killed on a scooter. That is the start of it. E-scooters are dangerous. It has reached the stage where we need some kind of regulation. It seems to be a free-for-all. I saw something in one of the national newspapers less than 12 months ago. I was on my local radio station talking about e-scooters and mentioned that there was a photograph in the newspaper of four people on one scooter. I remember the presenter told me it did not happen. When we looked at the photograph, there was a man, a woman and two children on the e-scooter. The man had a child on his shoulders. That was in Dublin. We require enforcement.

There are people out there who use e-scooters to go to work. Kids use them to go to school and wear helmets and do everything right. However, a vast number of people do not give a damn about anybody at all. As I said, they come out on the roads. That also affects bicycles. I am saying to the Minister that we need enforcement. We need to slow down, especially in built-up areas. As I said earlier, every death is one too many.

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