Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We know that road deaths have increased, and have increased significantly, so I not only welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill but welcome the Bill itself. The legislation will mark a good step forward in what needs to be an ongoing effort to ensure the safety and well-being of every individual on our roads, including drivers, pedestrians, cyclists and all road users. However, I feel this Bill cannot stand alone in the bid to address road safety. Ireland has witnessed far too many tragedies resulting from road accidents. The loss of lives, the shattered families and the communities left grieving serve as stark reminders for an overdue urgent need for action.

A total of 184 people died in 173 fatal collisions in 2023, compared to 155 deaths in 149 collisions in 2022. This represents an increase of 29 deaths, or a 19% rise. A 19% rise constitutes a crisis that I think we all recognise. It is clear that there is a need for change now. So far this year, there have been 21 fatalities on our roads, a number and trend that if continued throughout the rest of the year will result in yet another rise in the level of road deaths in this country. After so many years of hard work in reducing the number and having the consistent trend downwards, the Minister of State, like all of us, will acknowledge that this trend is something we cannot tolerate and something that needs to be turned around. I acknowledge that the Bill is an attempt to do that.

The attitudes of the drivers on our roads who do not adhere to speed limits, abuse substances and drive recklessly are a danger to every other road user, including themselves. The Minister of State and his Department need to examine this issue in a broader context as a symptom of societal issues that need to be addressed. To that point, we need to see a crackdown on the staggering number of drivers who, as shown by a report in The Irish Timeslast year, are driving around on provisional licences and have never taken the driving test. Some of them any have no intention of driving or may be sitting on waiting lists but the reality is that before they are accredited safe drivers, they present a risk to others on the road.

RTÉ reported last week that a driver on the M1 in Balgatheran, County Louth was apprehended travelling at speeds at 228 km/h over the bank holiday weekend. This was one of approximately 3,000 motorists who were detected speeding that weekend. Over that weekend there was an increase in Garda resources and detections and that resulted in the high number of motorists being caught. That shows that if we have the resources, we will catch and apprehend people who are breaking the law and speeding. It is instances such as these that make legislation such as this Bill so necessary. Along with that, however, we need to see more gardaí on our roads, such as we saw on the bank holiday weekend. According to the Minister for Justice herself, road detections last year decreased and road deaths were up. There is a clear correlation. There is no clearer barometer for a need to increase Garda resources than this.

On this, the Government will say that the budget for An Garda Síochána is the highest it has ever been. Of course it is, but we have the largest population we have seen since the Famine, and it is growing. Just having the highest of level of funding for Garda does not mean we have the requisite number of gardaí. In fact, we know we do not. We certainly do not have the requisite number of gardaí on our roads. That the budget of the Garda is consistently used as a shield to somehow pretend there are not gaping holes in the service is laughable. The previous speaker, Deputy Ward, referred to the last time he was randomly breathalysed.

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I share a similar experience. I have been driving for 20 years. In the first ten years, I would have been breathalysed regularly as I bumped into random breath tests all over Dublin and the country. I cannot remember the last time I bumped into a random breath test. I think it was on the quays, probably about five years ago. Talking to our friends and people in our circle, they say the same thing.

One of the key provisions of the Road Traffic Bill is the revision of the default speed limits. This is a long overdue measure. There are too many roads all over the country that, purely due to the speed limit on them, are a real danger. Without the Garda presence to monitor the speed of motorists and intervene in reckless driving, we will see no real change in motorists' behaviour. We all know that speed limits in the eyes of all of us are seen as a guide for what speed to drive at the entire time, not simply as a maximum speed not to exceed. This can be fine on motorways, but in more rural parts of my constituency and in other places all over the country, there are winding roads with 80 km/h speed limits that are frequently poorly lit and can be a real hazard on which to drive. By recalibrating default limits, there is an opportunity to significantly curtail dangerous driving and make unsafe roads safer.

I welcome that this Bill would empower local authorities to tailor speed limits to specific roads where they see fit. Deciding the correct speed limits for roads can and will be a contentious issue for people. Knowing that local authorities can step in should provide certainty for people who are sceptical about these changes. We all know that there is corporate memory and understanding in local authorities. They know where the danger spots are. We need to rely on their knowledge and work with them to help make our roads safer.

If we bring in laws which people feel are ridiculous or make no sense, they simply will not abide by them. The goal of the Bill should be to make it easier for gardaí to enforce these laws, not to make it more difficult. We know that we can no longer tolerate the reckless disregard for speed limits that endangers lives and undermines the very fabric of our society. Throughout everything that we experience in relation to road safety, there is one eternal truth, which is that speed kills. Furthermore, the introduction of significant reforms to penalty points systems in the Road Traffic Bill, both through fixed charges and court convictions, is increasingly important. Under this legislation, individuals who accrue multiple fixed charges for penalty point offences committed simultaneously will face proportional penalties reflective of their actions. Similarly, those convicted in court of such offences will be subject to the full weight of the law, ensuring that accountability is upheld and justice is served. Closing this loophole is vital.

The statistics around penalty points are frankly shocking. As of 30 September 2023, a total of 551,245 people had points on their licences. This represented an increase of more than 8,000 from the same date in 2022. More than half a million drivers have penalty points. Most of these drivers - just under 400,000 - had three penalty points. Some 36,809 had two penalty points and 59,000 had six points. Overall, 17,000 drivers had seven or more penalty points, with a total of 895 drivers across the country having 12 points. Last year, I welcomed the Minister of State's creative measures to tackle speeding by doubling penalty points on bank holiday weekends. Unfortunately, it is clear from the statistics over the recent bank holiday and from last year as a whole that these measures alone will never fix the issue. Addressing the behaviour of drivers with a 365-days-a-year approach is needed.

I want to see a more succinct way of reducing the number of road deaths. That has to be included in the expansion and improvement of our public transport services nationwide. With the population increase, allied to our lack of public transport options, particularly in rural and commuter areas, too many people in Ireland are still forced to have to get into their cars. More cars on the road will equal more accidents. It is a simple sum. Accidents on the road will decrease the fewer cars there are. This means we need to see a continued commitment of faster action on our big infrastructure projects. The full delivery and roll-out of BusConnects and MetroLink are vital, as well as Cork Luas, an increase in our commuter rail network, and BusConnects in our other major cities. People want to make use of public services. We have seen an increase in bus use. I will credit the Minister of State and some of the Government measures to reduce fares for that. Where BusConnects has been rolled out, we have seen an increase in public transport use. We need to get further action and energy behind it.

The condition of our national roads also has to be made a Government priority. We know that TII warned the Minister, Deputy Ryan, in 2022 that a failure to properly invest in new road projects and improvements could result in 77 deaths and 381 injuries over the next five years. With road deaths continuing to trend upwards, we need to ensure that investment in maintenance of our national roads is increased to ensure they are made safe. This is not a climate issue. It does not cut across any of the climate agenda. Maintenance of our existing road network is vital for all. Continued improvements in active travel and safe cycling networks will make the roads safer for all users.

Recognising the evolving nature of substance abuse and its impact on road safety is absolutely vital. The move to expand the mandatory intoxicant testing to encompass not only alcohol but also drugs in this Bill is welcome. The warning signs have been there to show that drug driving has increasingly become an issue, as much as driving under the influence of alcohol. Gardaí have made it clear that the prevalence of substance abuse among motorists has been on the rise and that this is an issue that cannot be ignored by Government any longer. It is welcome to see provisions on that in the Bill. By mandating comprehensive testing protocols, more individuals will be deterred from endangering themselves and others through reckless behaviour behind the wheel. However, mandating it in legislation is one thing; having the resources to actually police it on the roads is another, to refer back to my earlier point.

We need more work on awareness of what puts people over the limit. I am thinking of prescription drugs which can impair driving. With drug testing becoming mandatory, it is even more important that people are educated on which medications are safe to take while driving and which can, and often do, impair both their driving and their judgment. Codeine, for example, is a commonly prescribed drug and will come up as a positive result when tested by gardaí. If that is coupled with evidence of motorists being impaired when driving, such as weaving back and forth, they would end up with the same charge as those individuals who may have consumed an illegal substance. They are still intoxicated while driving. This is where increased education is so important. There needs to be a renewed effort from all parties involved to increase awareness of the issue of impairment when driving while on prescribed medication.

Ultimately, our goal has to be to decrease road deaths to zero. The methods to do this will, for some, seem radical. We all know there has been a backlash against the idea of lowering default speed limits, for example, but we now find ourselves with no other choice. Whether it is seen as radical or not, as a society, we have to acknowledge that the abuse of speed limits has become a key factor in road deaths. The number of people dying on our roads cannot be allowed to become a new normal. We had years of progress on road deaths and the trends were going in the right direction. Unfortunately, those have been reversed. Vision Zero has, for me, become a static document. We need renewed energy for that document and its vision to reduce our road deaths to zero.

Let me be clear that the passage of this Bill is but one step in a larger, more multifaceted journey towards achieving Vision Zero for road fatalities. It will require collective action, unwavering resolve, sustained investment in infrastructure, education and enforcement. We also need to see improvements in driver behaviour.

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