There have been more road deaths so far this year than in all of 2022. Something’s badly wrong

As of last Friday, 157 people had died on Irish roads so far in 2023. This already surpasses the 156 killed on our roads in all of 2022. That figure was the highest in six years. Before last weekend, 33 more people had been killed on Irish roads than from January to the beginning of November in 2022. Forty more people have died this year than the same period in 2019.

Behind every death is a tragedy felt in families, groups of friends, colleagues, neighbours and communities. Every serious injury upends the lives of people and their loved ones. Something is wrong. Why is the national situation regressing?

In the US, for example, road deaths increased during the pandemic. There is a suggestion that people engaged in riskier behaviour on the roads, or that because public health messaging was monopolised by Covid-19, other messages slipped from the broader consciousness. Maybe it was down to fewer people using public transport. Maybe because roads were emptier, people took more chances.

Post-pandemic, many of us felt agitated, worn down, perhaps with a shorter fuse – all things that contribute to risky behaviour. There were far fewer people on Irish roads in 2020, but the number of people who died (146) was higher than 2019 (140). Context is important. Road deaths in Ireland had been decreasing, dramatically in fact: by 70 per cent between 1990 and 2021.

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The year 2006 was a turning point for road deaths in Ireland. Even though road deaths were decreasing – down from the five-hundreds in the early 1980s, and the four hundreds in the 1990s – 2006′s figure was ultimately symbolic, because it demonstrated an average of one death every day.

The Road Safety Authority was established in 2006. Around the same time, road safety influencers and campaigns in media came to the fore. This cultural shift created a tremendous amount of awareness around road safety. The Ray D’Arcy Show, then on Today FM, ran a blunt but effective ‘Don’t be a F***ing Eejit’ radio advertising campaign, as well as repeatedly raising the issue on the programme. The Irish Independent ran consistent reports and stories. Many other newspapers acted similarly, but the Independent’s campaigning journalism on this topic was almost relentless.

The Road Safety Authority also had a leader in the form of Noel Brett who grew awareness around the agency. Brett became a well known figure in Irish media. In the role, he was serious and knowledgeable. The agency later enlisted a high profile chairperson, Gay Byrne.

Today, in my opinion, the agency is not as prominent or effective in its communication with the Irish public. Its CEO is Sam Waide, who is not a household name. Its chairperson is Liz O’Donnell and while she is known by a certain portion of society due to her previous role in political life, she doesn’t have the same connection to the Irish public as Byrne.

The comparison is of course unfair. Byrne was a singular figure in Irish society. So who is the person now, the communicator, the household name who could at least try to replicate that connection? This is the question the RSA needs to ask itself regarding messaging.

Due to the fragmentation of media, cutting through is harder. When everyone isn’t reading the same newspapers en masse, or all watching live broadcast news, or all simultaneously listening to radio programmes, it’s much harder to get a cohesive and consistent message across. If you’re not watching broadcast TV, you’re also not seeing road safety ads.

The RSA needs consistent campaigns with popular independent Irish podcasts until the message gets through. This doesn’t just mean a peppering of ready-made ads, but direct sponsorship and paid campaigns. Messaging needs to take advantage of the para-social relationships listeners develop with podcast hosts, who create a kind of intimacy and authority that is similar but more pronounced than traditional radio. Then do the same with online influencers.

Embed road safety messaging further in school and third-level education. When people are educated early and well on road safety, they bring that learning into adulthood. This doesn’t mean demanding every young person leaves secondary school with their driving licence (although there should be more life skills taught in school), but it would create a positive homogeneity and standard on road safety across driving, cycling, pedestrian awareness and so on.

In global terms, Ireland has an extraordinarily low rate of road fatalities per population. There is only a handful of countries safer than us, including Hong Kong, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland. While tragic accidents may be over-amplified in media, foregrounding success can also lead to complacency.

Outside of education and awareness, black spots and “dangerous roads” should not be a thing. If an issue is known, it’s not enough to acknowledge or warn people about it; it must be fixed. That’s something the State should seek to achieve with a sense of immediacy. A single driver can take care, be responsible, and abide by rules, but they can’t do anything about dangerous roads.