Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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578. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if there is a right of appeal before a person is disqualified from driving, having received 12 penalty points within the required period. [27462/19]

Shane Ross (Dublin Rathdown, Independent)
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Disqualification from driving based on penalty points occurs when a person reaches a cumulative total of 12 or more points, except in the case of learner or novice drivers, who are disqualified on reaching or exceeding 7 points. Penalty points may be endorsed on a licence record following payment of a fixed charge for a road traffic offence or following conviction in court.

Where an offence is a fixed charge offence, the person has the option of refusing to pay the fixed charge and going instead to court. If they are then convicted in court - or if the offence is not a fixed charge offence and they have gone straight to court and been convicted - they have the right of appeal against that specific conviction.

As penalty points are accrued in relation to specific offence, a person who has paid a fixed charge has accepted that they are receiving penalty points, while a person convicted in court who has chosen not to exercise their right to appeal, or who has appealed and lost, has had an opportunity to challenge each and every conviction and its consequential penalty points.

There is no specific mechanism for challenging disqualification once the person reaches 12 points, nor is there any need for one, given that each penalty point event could have been challenged.