Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)

At the outset I thank Senators for facilitating the debate, particularly at short notice. I appreciate that the House has agreed to take it in this manner. The Bill is a technical instrument, designed to provide legal clarity to just one element of the legislation relating to drink driving and to remove a possible basis for a challenge to certain drink driving prosecutions.

The particular issues being addressed consist of the replacement of section 10 of the Road Traffic Act 2002 and the amendment of section 13 of the Road Traffic Act 1994. The position as regards section 10 of the 2002 Act is that I have received legal advice to the effect that a difficulty could arise if I were to provide for its full implementation. The House will recall from the debate on that Act that this section provided for the extension of the grounds under which a driver was required to submit to a preliminary breath test. Senators will be aware of my intention to pursue that extension. However, in preparing for that, a legal difficulty was identified as regards the sequence of the subsections in that section, in so far as they are referred to in section 13 of the Road Traffic Act 1994. That section relates to the obligations on a person to submit to a blood urine or evidential breath test in a Garda station and any potential question as to the capacity of the Garda to invoke powers in that important section needs to be addressed.

I took the view that in order to provide for the extension of roadside breath testing and to ensure the legal certainty of the powers relating to the carrying out of the evidential tests, I would ask the Oireachtas to agree to the technical amendments I propose in the Bill. In that context I am anxious to ensure that the extended powers to carry out roadside breath testing should be available to the Garda at the earliest possible date so as to support this year's Christmas drink driving campaign which gardaí are pursuing jointly with the National Safety Council.