The Northern Ireland Road Safety Monitor 2013 reveals that the proportion of drivers who would drive the morning after consuming a considerable amount of alcohol the night before, has fallen over the year from 30% to less than a quarter (23%).
The annual report, which was published on 29 October, also shows that the majority of people (69%) oppose drivers taking one drink and driving. However, after one drink around one fifth (22%) of drivers would still get behind the wheel. Both of these findings are similar to the previous year’s report.
There continues to be overwhelming support for imposing the current set of drink drive penalties on those found exceeding newly proposed limits in Northern Ireland.
For learner and restricted drivers exceeding the new lower limit of 20mg/100ml, 82% of respondents supported imposing the current set of penalties. Although the same lower limit is proposed for professional drivers, this attracted a higher level of support for using existing penalties (88%). For all other drivers, a new lower limit of 50mg/100mls is proposed and just less than nine out of every ten respondents (89%) support the use of existing penalties for drivers caught exceeding this.
Alongside this, the vast majority of respondents considered drink driving (88%) and drug driving (84%) to be offences where police should have the power to seize a vehicle.
Speeding, carelessness on the roads, and drinking and driving are still considered the three main factors in causing injuries or deaths on Northern Ireland’s roads – cited by 78%, 61% and 59% of respondents respectively.
The survey also gathered information on the level of awareness and effectiveness of DOE road safety advertising campaigns. Individuals’ views were sought on a number of road safety topics which included mobile phones, drink driving, school buses, pedestrians and fatigue.
Click here to read the full DOE Northern Ireland news release.
The PSNI’s Recorded Injury Road Traffic Collisions and Casualties Northern Ireland 2012 Report details the main principal causation factors for collisions in which people were killed or seriously injured during 2012 as:-‘Excessive Speed having regard to conditions’ (8 deaths 92 serious injuries – 100 KSI casualties), ‘Inattention or attention diverted’ (5 deaths, 73 serious injuries – 78 KSI casualties) and ‘Impaired by alcohol/drugs – driver rider’ (8 deaths, 59 serious injuries – 67 KSI casualties).
The composite causation factor ‘Careless Driving’ which comprises several principal causation factors (including ‘inattention or attention diverted’ and ‘driving too close’ resulted in 14 deaths and 387 serious injuries (401 KSI Casualties).
The most common principal causation factors for slight casualties in 2012 were: ‘Inattention or attention diverted’ (1,521 slight injuries), ‘Driving too close’ (1,021 slight injuries) and ‘Emerging from minor road without care’ (733 slight injuries).
The full report can be found at http://www.psni.police.uk/2012_detailed_trends_report_-_annual_bulletin_-_published_26th_june_2013.pdf
Suzanne Napier, Road Safety Statistician, DOE
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The correspondents are ill-informed – causation data shows beyond dispute that speeding – i.e. above limits – is involved in only 5% of all injury collisions, and 8% of KSI collisions. And even then, not necessarily as the primarly causal factor. Nor is drink-driving, unacceptable as it is, that large a factor, compared to by far the single largest cause at more than 75%, loss of attention/concentration.
Idris Francis Fight Back with Facts Petersfield
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