The new chairman of the Road Safety Authority, Gay Byrne, has said he is frustrated and angered at the continuing high death toll on the roads.
The broadcaster admitted to feeling powerless after the high number of deaths on the State's roads over the bank holiday weekend. "One can only have a sense of frustration and anger and helplessness that such deaths continue on the road," he said.
He urged drivers to act responsibly to make the roads safer. "For example, whatever speed you find you're doing on the road, back off by 5kmp/h. Just do that and don't think about it, don't question it, just back off whatever speed you're doing and slacken off by 5km per hour.
"And then in addition to that, try to do something courteous or mannerly with other road users and try very hard to relax and take it easy while still being vigilant."
He added: "Unfortunately, all the warnings and all the dreadful, harrowing television commercials and radio commercials and photographs in the newspapers down through the last few years, apparently there are a great number of people who just don't read newspapers, don't watch television, don't listen to radio and don't pay them any heed and so it goes on, it's appalling."
He acknowledged that anecdotal evidence pointed to significant numbers of foreign nationals being involved in road crashes. However, he said conclusions could only be drawn after the rigorous collating of data.
The Road Safety Authority's chief executive designate, Noel Brett, said he intended to contact a number of foreign embassies to try to ensure that road safety advice reaches immigrants.