Minister urges motorists to slow down

An appeal for motorists to slow down and make a special effort to reduce the number of fatalities on the Republic's roads, particularly between now and the end of the year, has been made by the Minister of State for Transport, Mr Ivor Callely.

The Minister was making his comments following the latest road death of a woman in Co Kilkenny yesterday morning.

The woman was the 356th person to be killed in road traffic accidents this year. The number is 20 more than all road deaths in 2003.

Gardaí said the woman was killed when her car was in collision with a lorry, at Flagmount, near Gowran, Co Kilkenny, at about 9.20 a.m.

A male driver of the lorry was taken to St Luke's hospital in Kilkenny where his injuries were described as minor and he was discharged later. Gardaí have appealed for witnesses to contact Kilkenny Garda station.

Commenting on the rise in road deaths, Mr Callely said the figures were "a cause of concern for everyone".

He said enforcement was a key issue but he pointed out that Government road safety strategies, including the penalty points system, had reduced fatalities from a potential 550 per year.

"That is a reduction of about 35 per cent on what the level would be if we did nothing. We are not complacent and I would particularly appeal to everyone to use public transport or to adopt the nominated driver scheme over the coming weeks as the Christmas party season gets underway."

The Minister also said that as a general rule drivers should reduce their speed at all times.

However, the Fine Gael spokeswoman on transport, Ms Olivia Mitchell, said the blunt fact was that people need to believe that they are going to be caught if they transgress. "And the Government have allowed that belief to slip." Ms Mitchell said the current penalty points system was too cumbersome as enforcement agency computers were not linked and drivers know that enforcement "would take every garda we have". Ms Mitchell said the date for the implementation of computerised penalty points, linking the databases of the courts, the licensing authorities and the gardaí had been promised on "many, many" occasions but had yet to be delivered.

A spokesman for the AA, Mr Conor Faughnan, said that while it was unfortunate that the enforcement pillar of the road safety strategy had not been done well enough it was "driver behaviour which led to the crashes not the gardaí". According to Mr Faughnan, however, the situation is about to improve.

"Garda enforcement is considerably more visible this Christmas and early in the new year we believe a better structure will be in place, so we have every reason to be optimistic. There is also the prospect of the new Garda Traffic Force which the AA first suggested seven years ago," he added.