The latest figures on drink-driving arrests are both deeply worrying and profoundly depressing. They show beyond doubt that, despite all the progress that has been made in the past couple of decades, there are still people who are quite willing to drive while under the influence of alcohol. They also raise the possibility that the numbers drink-driving are actually edging back up.
It is difficult to be definitive about that, but we know that in the first two weeks of the Road Safety Authority and gardai beginning their Christmas and New Year campaign a staggering 341 people were arrested on suspicion of drink-driving — an increase of 35 per cent on last year.
The suspicion must surely be that those figures, bad as they are, are merely the tip of the iceberg. Gardai cannot be everywhere, at all times. There were 3517 checkpoints in the first two weeks of the campaign — so one in ten produced an arrest for suspected drink-driving. That gives some indication of the depth of the problem that remains on Irish roads.
Drink-driving is thankfully nowhere near as socially acceptable as it was 20 years ago, but it is clearly still not the absolute taboo it should be. There’s no question that getting in a car after drinking is among the most selfish and dangerous things a person can do. It is putting his or her own life at risk and the lives of others. It turns, as one judge put it recently, a mode of transport into a “lethal instrument that has the capacity to kill and maim”.
The devastating impact of that is powerfully brought home in the RSA’s television advert this Christmas. The ad features the hugely courageous parents of Ciarán Treacy, a four-year-old boy who was killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver in 2014, as well as the emergency services and medical team who fought to save him. It is a heart-breaking account of how lives can be shattered by drink-driving. All those featured in the advert deserve enormous credit. It must have been an incredibly difficult thing to do, particularly for Gillian and Ronan Treacy. But they did so to help others.
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Yet somehow this message is still not getting through to enough people. We know that alcohol was a factor in 38 per cent of all fatal crashes between 2008 and 2012, shattering the lives of hundreds of families. And experts say that anecdotal evidence indicates that this percentage, if anything, is increasing. Young male drivers at night remain a significant problem, they say.
That information is particularly disturbing because most of us assumed that drink-driving was something that mainly happened with a hard core of older drivers who grew up in an era in which it was less socially unacceptable to drive under the influence and then stubbornly refused to move with the times. But that is clearly a misconception. Despite everything, young drivers are very much part of the problem.
Tackling that is clearly easier said than done. Enforcement, via checkpoints, is obviously crucial. There must be a genuine fear of getting caught for those tempted or inclined to drive after drinking and tough penalties for those convicted — even those not involved in a collision — are essential. Education is also hugely important and the earlier we get across the message to young people about the dangers and sheer selfishness of drink-driving the better.
But it is not enough to leave it to the authorities and piously intone that something must be done about it. We all have a role to play — even the majority of people who would never drink and drive. First and foremost, of course, it is an issue of personal responsibility, but we all need to make it clear to people in our company who might be thinking of using their car after alcohol that such an action is wrong and immoral — along with outlining the potential consequences. Publicans have a role to play in this regard too.
It is certainly not easy or straightforward. But if we are to continue to make progress in tackling the scourge of drink-driving — and in the process help to safeguard the lives of people on our roads — then only an attitude of zero tolerance will suffice. And that is down to all of us.