Urgent action needed on road safety, says Minister

“It’s getting worse and July has been a very hard month,” says Shane Ross

Minister for Transport Shane Ross has said "urgent action" is necessary to combat road deaths.

Speaking in the wake of the deaths of 12 people on Irish roads in the last five days, the Minister said road safety was a critical issue. “It’s getting worse and July has been a very hard month,” he said during a visit to Co Tipperary yesterday. “For the families, it’s an absolute tragedy.”

Mr Ross said that he met the Road Safety Authority last week.

“We realise things are not as good as what they should be. They’re worse than they were last year and urgent action obviously is necessary and we’re looking at that as a really critical problem.”

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Asked about specific actions which could be taken, he said: “We don’t know at the moment, specifically, but obviously we’ll have to look at any measures that can be taken to discourage people or to stop people from doing things that are dangerous on the road or putting themselves at risk or other people at risk”.

Mr Ross said that it would be “offensive” to start attributing blame for this week’s deaths.