Road regulations regime criticised

The Irish Insurance Federation has clashed with the National Safety Council and the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, over the enforcement of speed and drink-driving regulations, claiming that people driving while drunk know they are not likely to be detected.

The federation has also claimed the penalty points system is rapidly losing effect, and criticised the absence of random breath testing and the failure to reinvest the 2 per cent insurance levy in road safety.

The federation made its comments at a National Safety Council international conference on road safety in Killiney, Co Dublin, yesterday.

Opening the conference, Mr Brennan reiterated his view that the State's road safety measures were working. He pointed out that in the 19 months since penalty points were introduced, 100 lives had been saved compared to the 19 months beforehand.

Mr Brennan said the Government was convinced the points system was saving lives, with deaths on Irish roads at a four-year low. He was committed to the continuing application of points to a range of offences, which would be supported by legislation.

The chairman of the National Safety Council, Mr Eddie Shaw, said the Republic had reduced the number of road traffic fatalities per month.

In 1997, before the implementation of the previous road safety strategy, there were 40 deaths per month.

Last year it was down to fewer than 30 deaths a month and the target in the new strategy was for 20 deaths per month, a figure which equates to six deaths per 100,000 of population per year.

"In fact, in the first four months of the penalty points strategy, November and December 2002, and January and February 2003, the figure reached 20 per month. This is the best practice figure internationally."

Mr David Lyle, managing director of Lyle Baillie International, which is responsible for the Republic's dramatic road safety advertisements, said the Italian road safety authorities had purchased the "Slow Down Boys" advert and dubbed it into Italian.

The other advertisement was purchased by the Israeli government which used it as part of its road safety campaign. The awareness of the campaign had been well over 90 per cent, Mr Lyle told the conference.

Mr Niall Doyle, corporate affairs manager of the IIF - one of the sponsors of the conference - said he was "frankly disappointed" with the level of enforcement and detection of drink and speeding offences.

"Much is made of this figure of 100,000 speeding detections in 2003, but the figure was 350,000 in 2002 and about 355,000 in 2001. "Does this mean that people are speeding less or the gardaí have stopped detection?"

Mr Doyle said the same applied to random breath testing for drink driving.

"Fundamentally, if you drive home drunk tonight, the likelihood is that you are unlikely to be stopped".

Mr Doyle also said the industry was calling for the 2 per cent Government levy to be scrapped or to be reinvested in road safety measures.