Violet-Anne Wynne (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Road safety is an issue of acute concern for every Member of this House. As we head into the bank holiday weekend, we are all thinking of the 155 lives lost on Irish roads since the start of this year, an increase of 36 on this time last year. My thoughts are with all of those families today.

In the context of fatalities, I want to mention a section of the N67 in Clare. This road sees a high volume of traffic every day, including commuters travelling between Clare and Galway and tourists travelling to areas like the Burren and the Cliffs of Moher in one direction and Lahinch, Doonbeg and Kilkee in the other direction. I also highlight the N68 between Ennis and Kilrush, through Lissycasey. Both of these roads require serious investment. The N68 is above the national average with respect to the rate of injuries on the roadvis-à-vismaterial collisions.

I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge Mr. Jerry O'Connor, may he rest in peace, who was killed in August on the Ballycannoe road outside Ballyvaughan. Unfortunately, the incident leading to his death was the fifth serious accident on this part of the road, which is viewed locally as a blackspot. We need to see a significant reduction of speed. I spoke to his amazing wife, Helga, who has been so brave in speaking out about this issue since her husband's death. She mentioned that in Denmark, for example, speed limits in towns and villages have been reduced to 30 km/h. She asked if that can be considered in her area, which has a playground, church and health centre. I would also like to take this opportunity to formally invite the Minister to the area to see the road environment for himself and I look forward to the Minister's response on that.

I was disappointed to see that current expenditure in the Department will be down by 2% next year, especially in view of all of the talk about road safety in recent months. I raised the issue of local authority funding for roads with the Taoiseach a few months ago. He pointed to significant increases in inflation, a reduction in funding and talked about how that will have a knock-on effect.

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