Feargal Quinn (Independent)

We continue to read every day about deaths on the roads. I was stunned to learn yesterday that 300,000 provisional driving licences had been issued and that there is a six month waiting list for the driving test. The Government has not focused its attention on doing something about this. There are reciprocal arrangements with other countries such as Australia and South Africa whereby people who come from these countries do not have to do a test here but they do not apply to Canada and the United States. I do not understand this. If there are reciprocal arrangements in place, surely they should apply to Canada and the United States from where a substantial number of Irish people come here to live. They must undergo a test, including an eye test and so on. We should be focusing our attention on reducing the number of provisional licences. I gather there are in the region of 130,000 waiting to do the test.

To follow on Senator Hanafin's comments on the problem of stress, figures were published yesterday in Britain on the cause of strokes and heart attacks. A major cause is the amount of salt in people's diets. Hundreds of years ago there was a tax on salt both here and in Britain. I propose that we consider another such tax.