National road safety strategy has a long way to travel before it shows results

Up to 20 people are expected to die on the Republic's roads between now and the end of next week. This horrifying statistic - which the Garda Press Office describes as "about right" - is the reality of the festive season on our roads.

Many of the 408 people who died in road traffic accidents so far this year died as a result of drink-driving, many more as a result of speeding.

Already this month 25 people have died because of road traffic accidents - 11 of them in the week to last Thursday. If the year's figures are only as bad as last year - and the indications are that they will be worse - at least 12 more people will die over the next eight days.

Despite a five-year Government strategy, "The Road to Safety", which appeared initially to be successful at reducing road deaths from 472 in 1997 to 413 in 1999, the figures appear to be climbing again. The figure of 408 who died up to December 14th compares to 413 for the whole of last year.

Obviously social and cultural habits play a large part in the accident statistics. The striking television advertisement depicting the killing of a small boy, currently being screened only after 9 p.m., is a heart-stopping lesson on what can happen to an otherwise nice group of people when one of them mixes drink and driving.

But it is not all drink-driving. The Government strategy identifies speed and driver attitude as crucial elements in reducing the toll of lost lives. Based on an Australian model, the strategy also identifies driver education, engineering (in terms of road design), and enforcement as issues to be tackled.

The Australian campaign started with shock advertisements - one horrific scene famously ending with the direct message: "If you drink then drive, you're a bloody idiot." At a cost of AU$700,000 each, they also depicted in a graphic fashion that accidents happen in suburban streets and children die, mangled under cars that travel at 40 miles per hour in those streets in excess of the 30 mph limit.

Tiredness, not paying attention, that extra 10 feet that the car travels because it was 10 mph above the speed limit are all exposed as reasons for the high death toll. The programme, while costly, saw road fatalities reduced by 50 per cent in the first five years.

Critical to that success - and the success of our strategy according to the National Safety Council (NSC) - is a massive programme of education, community involvement, technical resources and commitment in the battle with attitude. The NSC says the issue needs to be addressed by the wider community, as opposed to simply the police and motorists.

The NSC points out that the Australians went to the local community and asked them where they wanted the spy cameras to go; they asked them what sort of environment they wanted to live in and in 96 per cent of the cases they put the cameras in places which the police would have chosen anyway. The community were less concerned about speeding on relatively safe major roads, but deeply concerned that the extra 10 mph in a village setting could be lethal.

Next, the police were able to show that 60 per cent of drivers were being checked for alcohol every month on average. People knew they were going to be caught if they were speeding. The judicial system was also overhauled, with new legislation to ensure that if a driver was detected speeding, a fine would be out in the post in 10 days.

In some cases people simply got a note through the post telling them where to surrender their licence.

Ultimately, education in the schools, the advertising on the television and the real probability of detection forced a change in attitude. The road-death toll for 1998 reached its lowest point since 1951.

However, while all the stakeholders here agree with the Australian model, and the five-year strategy is about to enter its fourth year, it remains largely unimplemented.

Among the aspects of the strategy on which the Government has failed as yet to deliver is the penalty points system. According to "The Road to Safety", this was to have been prepared in 1998 and introduced in 1999. 1999 was also chosen for the introduction of a driving theory test and the progressive deployment of speed cameras and evidential breath-testing.

A decision on daytime lights for cars was also to have been made, as was a decision on random breath testing for alcohol. The Government also failed to decide on practical initial training for motorcyclists or on obtaining quality certification for driving instructors, or upgrading Garda and other IT systems relevant to enforcement for 1999, as promised.

Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that the former chairman of the NSC, Mr Cartan Finegan, campaigned unsuccessfully throughout 1999 to have the Government commit £1 million in part funding to local authorities for road safety officers. He even commissioned the economist, Dr Peter Bacon, to produce a cost benefit analysis which showed that for every £1 spent on road safety there was a saving in cost to the State of £8.30.

Mr Finegan was not reappointed by the Government to the NSC last January.

However the new chairman, Mr Eddie Shaw, has been even more outspoken and wrote to the Taoiseach and Cabinet in August suggesting that a lack of financial and technical support from Government was seriously holding up the whole strategy. Last week he put the cost of that holdup at 50 lives.

"Of course there is a direct relation to lives lost. If there wasn't there would be no point to the strategy in the first place" he told The Irish Times.