Safe Driving Pledge: Presentation
Deputy Gormley: I thank the delegation for their attendance. Does the delegation share my view that we have become a very car dependent society — perhaps the most car dependent in Europe — and that this results from poor planning? Does it agree that the more car dependent we become, the more accidents that will occur? As a result of poor planning, people are now driving into Dublin from places such as Arklow and beyond and this is dangerous. We need to deal with the problem of poor planning in the first instance.
An important issue was raised by Senator Feeney. The technology of satellite navigation now exists, which will show, if people agree to its use, whether a vehicle is speeding. A pledge is fine but in my view it needs to be backed up by some form of action, such as ensuring that people who are given reduced rates of insurance obey the speed limits. The use of this technology would help reduce the number of road traffic accidents.
I am concerned about the culture of the car. I have watched Mr. Jeremy Clarkson’s show in which he drives cars. I watched his programme the other night and he was driving a car at 120 mph down an autobahn. This is a way of glamorising speed. Anything can happen when driving at that speed and accidents will occur. We must find a way of deglamorising speed because it has become a real problem with regard to young males. I hope the delegation will consider this problem.
I reiterate that satellite navigation is technically possible and could provide a solution. Some people regard it as big brother, in that it monitors what people in a car are doing and can identify the location of the car. This may be the case but the upside is that it may reduce the incidence of speeding.
Deputy Twomey: The pledge is a good idea but I understand the difficulty of making it work. Sometimes the pledge is taken voluntarily and encouraging people to do something voluntarily has more long-standing benefits than using law enforcement, whether through the police or insurance companies, to change their way of thinking and driving habits. I wish Bishop Walsh the best of luck with the pledge but there will be many hurdles to jump before it is achieved. It is difficult to change minds, as we have seen with penalty points. When they were no longer a focus, bad driving habits returned very quickly.
In my experience it can take six to seven months to get someone into the National Rehabilitation Clinic from an acute hospital. Some of the figures Dr. Delargy gave were interesting. Is speed still the main cause of the high velocity injuries Dr. Delargy described or do lack of safety belts and cars coming off the road and rolling over cause them? Would proper law enforcement, with gardaí on the roads where most of these accidents occur, rather than where drivers speed, make a significant difference?
We need to consider some simple practical points if we are to effect any change. It is pointless to talk about barriers on the motorways and the sides of the roads because they will take so long and be so expensive to erect that it simply will not happen. In the short term gardaí could be placed on roads where accidents are most likely to happen and we could support that measure.
Dr. Delargy said the number of people suffering from injuries admitted to the National Rehabilitation Centre has fallen. Is that because they cannot get in owing to the increase in violent assaults? How significant is the issue of violent assaults? I have noticed a change in the past decade in that perpetrators of an assault pulverise a person and sometimes the two parties do not know one another. The incident might be a random assault on the street.
There is also the phenomenon of kicking people severely in the head. The perpetrator may feel the victim will not be able to identify him or her because of the resulting amnesia. This seems to be becoming more prevalent but that may be because we hear more about such attacks whereas Dr. Delargy has the stark facts and figures to reveal the significance of these assaults.