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VFI Statement on the Road Traffic Bill and reduction of Blood Alcohol Levels Permissible for Drivers

31-October-2009

The Vintners' Federation of Ireland (VFI) is extremely disappointed with the recently published Road Traffic Bill and the reduction of the Blood Alcohol level permissible for drivers from 80mg/100ml to the lower level of 50mg.

The VFI has always welcomed any measure that will help prevent road accidents and fatalities but we strongly believe that this Bill targets the wrong areas.

Everybody, including the Minister and the RSA, accepts that speed is the number one killer on our roads. What has the Minster done about it? NOTHING.

This Road Traffic Bill and BAC level reduction is a smokescreen to cover up the inaction or inability to take action on speed - an unfortunate smokescreen to target the wrong people in the wrong way.

This current debate on drink driving has lacked balance.

The RSA and Minister for Transport both highlighted that only three countries in Europe have a BAC level of 80mg. What both neglect to state, is that these three countries, Ireland, the UK and Malta, are three of the safest countries in Europe and rank in the top six for road safety. If there was a direct link between BAC levels and road safety, then surely these three nations would be amongst the worst for road safety? What is also not stated, is that in many countries in Europe, one does not lose their license for any period of time until a level in excess of 100mg is reached.

This issue is not just about publicans. Successive governments have already taken action to ensure their demise through the level of excise and the removal of the groceries order amongst other measures.

This is about the patrons who support pubs and act in a responsible way and are now to be penalised.

The government, in this Bill, seeks to penalise the wrong people in a draconian manner. The very people targeted by the Minister in this Bill are law abiding individuals living in rural Ireland who have a drink after a match, or after the Mart or just getting out to socialise with friends and neighbours where no transport infrastructure exists.

These are hardly the citizens that the government should seek to penalize.

The overall debate on road safety has lacked any meaningful balance and has concentrated on an area of road safety way down the list of priorities. What would save lives is curtailment of speed, control of "boy racers" and implementation of existing laws in place. RSA research clearly shows that the 18-30 male group is the problem demographic and that speeding is the biggest killer on our roads.

The Minister and RSA have used the BAC level and debate to hide their inability to tackle the issue of speeding and their inaction on this matter.

There has been a lot of noise from various Ministers and the opposition about protecting small businesses and helping businesses in rural Ireland. We would like to see action on this and less talk. We now need to see the details of these proposals.