500,000 drivers have penalty points

Almost half a million people have been issued with penalty points and 93 drivers have 12 points resulting in six months disqualification, Minister for Transport Noel Dempsey told the Dáil.

During a Fine Gael private members' debate calling for the introduction of legislation to reform the penalty points system so that all fixed charge penalties were collected and enforced, Mr Dempsey said that the penalty points system was extended in April last year to include 35 offences and in September offences with mobile phones were added.

Mr Dempsey said that "a person in receipt of a fixed charge notice is not compelled by law to pay the fixed charge provided therein. Road traffic offences are criminal offences." He said the non-payment of a fixed charge amount "is an indication by that person that they wish to have the matter dealt with by the court".

Fine Gael spokesman Fergus O'Dowd claimed that the court system was "gummed up" because of the way penalty points system was operated. In many cases when penalty points were served on a driver, the motorist did not surrender their driving licence to have the points counted. They could not be forced to provide their licence, it was voluntary, he said.

Mr Dempsey said that if penalty points were given, a driver had 14 days to surrender their licence. "Failure to comply with such a direction is an offence under the Road Traffic Acts. The penalties on summary conviction of the offence of failing to surrender a licence can results, in the case of a first offence to a fine of up to €1,000 and/or a sentence of up to three months.

It was "therefore a matter for the gardaí to issue summonses and pursue those who have failed to surrender their licence."

Mr Dempsey said he would bring forward legislation next year to deal with a number of road safety issues. He was "willing to look at the law relating to penalty points and driver disqualifications, should the gardaí require any further statutory or legislative clarity in order to assist in the enforcement of these areas".

Mr O'Dowd said that in the first six months of this year, more than 88,000 summonses had been issued to people who had not paid fixed penalty notices within 56 days and that a further 20,000 were in the system, of which only 14,171 resulted in penalty points.

Almost 44,000 summonses were not served at all because the summonses did not reach the required person.

"It's not acceptable that 43,000 people who got penalty points would never be served with summonses when they didn't pay their fines," Mr O'Dowd said