Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 5 Apr 1967

Vol. 227 No. 6

Committee on Finance. - Road Traffic Bill, 1966: Second Stage (Resumed).

Debate resumed on the following motion:

That the Bill be now read a Second Time. — (Minister for Local Government.)

Mr. Barrett

Whilst we all welcome the tenor of this Bill generally, there are a few omissions upon which we should comment and there are a few insertions which are quite startling and which also call for comment. I would have thought, in regard to section 62 in which the Minister seeks power to make regulations providing for the removal of vehicles abandoned on a public road or in a car park, that he would also have sought power to remove abandoned vehicles from a public place. It is sometimes difficult to differentiate between a public place and a public road and if the Minister would consider it from that point of view, he might come to the conclusion that it would be as well to cover public places as well as public roads and car parks in the section.

Having regard to the number of tragedies caused by wandering animals — in my own constituency, a young man was killed by a horse which was the property of an itinerant and another young man had his face kicked in by a horse which was also owned by an itinerant — I was surprised that the Minister did not take this opportunity to revise the penalties for allowing animals to wander on the road. They are becoming more and more a menace every day as we have more and more cars on the road. The Minister might re-appraise the Bill in that regard.

There is an excellent case to be made for the compulsory insuring of pedal cycles and horse-drawn vehicles. The Minister in his opening speech did refer to pedal cycles and did indicate that on occasion they could be exceedingly lethal vehicles. In those circumstances, the Minister might consider whether at this stage it would be wise to make it compulsory to insure these bicycles and horse-drawn vehicles so that people injured or killed by them will not be left without redress.

Another thing which the Minister might consider is that under existing legislation the only thing for which a motor car owner is liable is the negligence of his servant or agent. There are many occasions on which the negligence of a passenger in the owner's car causes damage. A passenger may open the door of the vehicle suddenly and a cyclist or motor cyclist may collide with it and damage may be caused. At present the legislation does not make anybody other than the passenger liable for such damage and very grave damage can be done in such circumstances. I should like the Minister to consider that particular aspect of road traffic law before this Bill gets the final sanction of the Houses of the Oireachtas.

There is another matter, and I do not know exactly how it could be dealt with, but it should be dealt with, that is, that the legislation passed in 1961 created a new offence, not in lieu of but in addition to manslaughter, dangerous driving causing death or grievous bodily harm. Such cases have to go to the Circuit Court but such is the disposition of the authorities that the result is that the courts are cluttered up with deposition cases. This is a waste of time and the Minister might look into the matter.

These are the omissions to which I referred and I have dealt with them rapidly because they might be dealt with in more detail on Committee Stage. We welcome the main intention of the Bill inasmuch as it is intended to discourage the depredations of the drunken driver in whose defence naturally no voice in this House would be raised but there are other aspects of the Bill which are very distressing and could be very dangerous. Deputy Fitzpatrick dealt with them already and I want to deal with them because on every occasion on which a Bill comes before the House making unfettered provision for the making of regulations by the Minister, I have always opposed and always will oppose such proposals on principle. It is true, of course, that legislation of that type is of such detail that it would be difficult for this House to deal with all of it and that is why we have this administrative law. That is the reason this House surrenders its rights to the Minister and his officials.

The Minister will make the stock reply and say that regulations made under this Bill will be laid before both Houses of the Oireachtas. That is no doubt true, but the laying of regulations before both Houses has not the same impact on the minds of Deputies, Senators, or the public, as the actual legislation which is put before the House in a Bill. For that reason I regret that this Bill makes provision for so many regulations. Some are startling.

I hope to deal in detail with the provisions of section 9 on Committee Stage. Reduced to ordinary everyday language, the provisions of section 9 (2) (b) mean that the Minister may prohibit some citizens from selling specified goods or specified classes of goods, while he may permit other people to sell them. I cannot understand the intention behind such a proposal. Goods of a pharmaceutical nature are not referred to in this Bill. Goods such as ordinary equipment for cars are of such a nature that they are fit to be sold either by all citizens or no citizen. The Minister should explain why he seeks to take power by regulation to prohibit certain citizens from selling certain specified goods or specified classes of goods, while he may permit other citizens to sell them. To say the least of it, that is open to abuse. In the absence of any good reason being given to the House by the Minister as to why he seeks power to make such a regulation, the House should be very slow to pass this section.

Section 9 (3) out-does in its daring any effort I have ever seen made by any Department of State in this House to take power to make regulations. I ask the Minister seriously to consider this matter before he asks the House to pass that subsection which provides:

Different regulations may be made under this section in respect of different classes of vehicle parts and for different circumstances.

I have never heard of such a wide proposition being made to this House. I have never before heard it being proposed in this House in such general terms that this House should surrender its rights and, indeed, its duties to any Department of State to make regulations "for different circumstances", without any further indication of what those circumstances might be. I think the House should reject this intrusion on its rights, and insist that the Minister should set out in the Bill the circumstances he has in mind for the making of these regulations.

The provision of a breathaliser for the purpose of having breath tests is something which, having regard to the experience in other countries, the House will approbate. I do not think it can be approbated in the manner in which the Minister puts it before us. It simply says that this is the instrument that is going to be used. It does not tell us the type of instrument. It does not tell us about its efficiency or whether it is capable of making mistakes. This is an instrument which could play an important part in the lives of some of our citizens. If the Bill passes in the terms in which it is proposed to us, it could have very serious consequences for motorists in general.

It is not good enough for the Minister to say that is the sort of instrument which is used elsewhere, and that is all about it. The Minister should tell us more about it. He should tell us the type of instrument it is. He should give us some specification and not ask us to give him carte blanche to make regulations in respect of this instrument. I do not think the House should let the Minister do this. I agree that there must be some sort of breath test but unless the Minister tells us what the experience has been, not only amongst the police forces in other countries but also amongst the motorists in other countries where this breathaliser is used, I do not think we should give him the power he seeks. Incidentally I may mention to the Minister that in the county of Cork there is a tree which bloometh which will defeat the objects of the breathaliser. If you suck some of the leaves of this tree, no breathaliser can find out whether you have an exact amount of alcohol in your blood.

Similarly we can object to the Minister asking us to give him carte blanche in regard to the procedure which will be followed in respect of the taking of blood and urine tests. None of us would willingly submit himself to these tests, but if it is necessary for the protection of the citizens that these tests must be submitted to, at least this House should be given the opportunity of having before it in detail the procedure which will be used in the sort of circumstances in which people will have to submit to blood or urine tests.

I regret that the Minister should even consider that this is a proper principle upon which to proceed, and say to the House: "Look, we are going to take blood and urine tests and we are not going to tell you how we do it." I do not understand why the Minister cannot tell us. If this legislation has been on the stocks long enough, and if this sort of legislation has already been implemented in other countries, there is a well tested pattern for taking blood and urine tests, and I do not know why the Minister does not put in green and black what his proposals are in that regard, so that when the Bill becomes an Act, the public will have in one document, readily procurable, the details of their rights and duties as members of the public.

It is all very well for the Minister to say they can be found in the regulations. Even for lawyers it is hard to find some regulations which are made by this House. They can, of course, be found in the bound copies of the Statutory Regulations which are published about five years after they are made. Those volumes are so voluminous that it is quite difficult to find the regulations in question. I suggest to the Minister that both as a headline to other Departments and as a matter of procedure and principle, he should put into this Bill the exact circumstances and the exact manner in which people will be asked to submit to the very embarrassing tests for which the Bill provides.

I do not see why the Minister should try to put so many parts of this enactment on the long finger by providing for regulations because, in effect, the making of regulations means that we start all over again in both the legislative and the administrative machinery. I suggest that so far as he can the Minister should avoid making regulations.

The regulations in the Principal Act of 1961 give the Commissioner of the Garda very sweeping powers in regard to bus routes, bus stops and various matters of that nature. There is a provision that the Commissioner shall consult with the local authorities before he makes regulations — but consult only. Having consulted with a local authority, he can throw all the representations and views of the local authority in the fire and proceed to follow his own sweet will in any way he wishes. That was in fact the spirit in which the Commissioner approached these regulations. That was the spirit in which he approached the statutory injunction which was placed upon him to elicit the views of the local authorities. I think it was a very bad thing. I think the Minister will agree with me that it is bad because, when we speak of the Commissioner, we speak of the local sergeant, the local inspector, the local superintendent or the local chief superintendent, whoever happens to be the man who actually looks after the traffic in the area. I think the only preoccupation of the average garda in that regard is to make the traffic safe and to make it flow just as the preoccupation of the local authority would be to preserve the business amenities and the various things which follow the flow of traffic. I know of grave hardships which have been imposed on industry by reason of the literally unfettered power of the Commissioner to make regulations in regard to matters of that nature.

There is provision in section 61 of the Bill that the Minister, by order, may pass on to road authorities in their functional areas the functions now carried out by the Commissioner under sections 84, 85, 86, 90, 93, 95 and 96 of the 1961 Act. Instead of giving to the Minister power to transfer these functions, I suggest that the section should be more explicit and more farreaching and should transfer to the road authorities in their functional areas the powers to make the regulations provided for in these sections.

The Minister referred to section 27 and to the use of the instrument to which I have already referred, that is, the breathaliser. He said it meant that a garda would not be able to stop individual vehicles at random and require a driver to take the test. There is nothing in the section to make that plain. Something should be inserted in the section to indicate to too officious gardaí — and there are a few — that they are not given the wide powers by the section that, from my reading, it would appear to give, that is, in relation to the breathaliser the Minister will prescribe by regulation for testing our breaths.

I agree with what Deputy Fitzpatrick said — I do not intend to traverse the ground he has already traversed — that refusal to take tests should not be proof but only prima facie proof of an offence. I press the Minister and I urge the members of the Minister's Party to press the Minister hard in this regard. This Bill cannot properly operate, when it is enacted, unless we have the goodwill of the populace towards it. I do not think we shall have the goodwill of the populace towards it if we provide too many oppressive sections in the measure. I think the provision of a section in the measure to make the tests prima facie evidence would be sufficient to deter the would-be drunken motorist from going on the roads and I would press the Minister very hard not to continue with the proposals in the Bill at this stage.

Another section which appals one is the Minister's proposal to take back power of which he divested himself in the 1961 Act, that is, the power to over-rule the courts in regard to disqualification from driving. I do not know why the Minister has done it. In his opening remarks, he gave no good reason why it should be done. I do not make any specific allegations against the Minister or his predecessors but it is plain to everybody in this House that it is a power which should not be given to a political figure because it is wide open to abuse of every description.

If a person is disqualified and is dissatisfied with the order of the court to which the disqualification was ancillary — usually the court which imposes the penalty and orders the disqualification is the District Court — he has a right to appeal to the Circuit Court. I do not see why, in these cases, the Minister should say, in effect, irrespective of what the district justice in the lower court might do and irrespective of what the judge on appeal might do: "I am going to take power to override the orders of the courts of justice of this country". It is particularly upsetting in view of the regulations made in this House not so long ago by one of the Minister's colleagues to the effect that people who were friends of his or of the Party would get preference, all other things being equal, and the danger of that is bound to arise in the minds of the public.

I think it is doing discredit to this House and it is doing discredit to the Minister's office to make a proposal to this House that we should give him back powers of which he divested himself so willingly under the 1961 Act. If he wishes to take them back, let him give some reasons better than those he gave when introducing this Bill. Otherwise, I would invite the House to reject the proposals of the Minister in that regard.

I might mention that a lot of the damage and the dangers with which this Bill proposes to deal could be prevented by a greater emphasis on publicity along the lines of "If you must drive, do not drink". The minimum of advertising is used. Space on public hoardings should be used for this purpose. Newspaper advertising and newspaper publicity generally should be used in this connection. I see nowhere any official advertisements directed to that end. There is one advertisement I pass when coming out of my constituency which has kindly been put up by a firm of beer manufacturers and it could refer to this particular matter because it does say: "Will you have a harp tonight"? That is as far as we have gone in regard to publicity of that type. I suggest to the Minister that we should use publicity which would indicate to the people that if they are going to drive at dangerous speeds or if they are going to drive when they have too much drink, the very grave possibility is that either they or some of their fellow-citizens will have a harp tonight.

Mr. Booth

I should like to say at the outset that I am delighted to see this Bill being introduced. Although I may have some comments on matters of detail to raise on Committee Stage, I have no hesitation in welcoming the Bill in principle. Before dealing with the Bill itself, I should like to make a few comments on contributions already made in this House by other Deputies. I should like, first, to make some comments on the contribution of Deputy Dillon. I agree very much with Deputy Tully who, in a later contribution, described Deputy Dillon's contribution as too highly coloured to be taken seriously. It is a pity Deputy Dillon spoke as he did because, while he had a number of very good points, he did, as Deputy Tully pointed out, overstate the case and thereby ruined it.

Deputy Dillon stated, as reported at column 207, his profound belief that if we could eliminate drunken driving, we would eliminate 50 per cent of the road accidents in this country. I think that is no exaggeration. The statistics are not very helpful to us in this regard because very often an accident happens which proves fatal and no evidence is subsequently given which can establish beyond all shadow of a doubt whether the deceased driver was intoxicated at the time of the accident or not. Certain doubts may be raised by evidence of his habits in the previous two hours before the accident that there is nothing definite and in all probability, that accident will not be attributed to drunken driving whereas in fact it should be.

Deputy Dillon did not appear to be happy with the proposal in the Bill to set up a new scientific standard of the alcohol content of the blood in opposition to the old standard of whether the person was or was not capable of exercising proper control over a vehicle. That is an unreal criticism. We already have speed limits and all drivers are agreed that a driver can be very dangerous while still complying strictly with the speed limit in operation on the stretch of road on which he is driving. Speed is not the only factor. Other factors may come into it, such as position on the road, failure to take proper observation, other traffic, and so on. Very rightly, we have laid it down that on certain stretches of road you may not exceed 30 miles an hour or 40 miles an hour and in more recent proposals we have some limits of 50 miles an hour also. If we are going to say, as we have done, that a speed in excess of that specified will be regarded as dangerous, it is perfectly logical for us to go on, in so far as drinking is concerned, to say that we are not concerned with any other test as to a driver's ability to control a vehicle and we will rely exclusively on the alcohol content of the blood.

This can in certain circumstances be slightly unjust, just as a prosecution for exceeding the speed limit may be unjust. I have had only one conviction under a speed limit and I am absolutely satisfied that I was not driving dangerously at all. I was driving at 37 miles an hour on entering a 30 mile an hour limit zone on an absolutely open stretch of road, with no houses or anything else. I am satisfied that I was not driving dangerously but I am also satisfied that I did technically break the law and I suffered for it. No great damage was done to me in that regard but I learned my lesson and am a great deal more careful now about entering a speed restricted area at precisely the speed specified on the notice. Even though it may well be that some drivers could have a higher alcohol content than that specified in this Bill and still be able to control the vehicle, it is in the public interest that we should lay down this standard and make it perfectly clear that if people drink above that level, they will not be tolerated on the public road.

Deputy Dillon painted a highly coloured picture of what may happen to elderly respectable ladies, in remarks which he made at column 208. These ladies to whom he was referring were, in his view, going to be subjected to intolerable indignities and they were also going to be the sort of ladies who would find it quite impossible to give a blood or urine specimen without fainting. That sort of criticism is really harmful. I only wish that Deputy Dillon had not spoiled his case by going along that line. To my mind, it is unthinkable that gardaí will stop drivers without having some good reason to suspect that they are not able to control their vehicles properly and an elderly maiden lady driving properly would not be in any danger of being accosted in this way. If any garda was found to be constantly stopping people, subjecting them to breathaliser tests and subsequently bringing them to the station only to find he had no case to bring against them, I am absolutely certain that he would have his ears pinned back very quickly by his superiors.

Deputy Tully made a very good point when he stated at column 268 that certain Deputies felt that it would be just too bad if these rich old ladies should be put to the indignity of doing certain things which would not be wrong at all if they were to apply to "what Deputy Dillon calls a coal heaver from the East Wall". I think that is very valid criticism by Deputy Tully. We have got to make it perfectly clear in everything we say that drunken or dangerous driving is a crime against the whole community and it is not a respectable crime either. It is a dirty rotten crime which is most often committed by people who are bad mannered, impatient and so imbued with the competitive spirit that they are prepared to take almost any risk to show that they can drive faster than anyone else on the road. Respectable old ladies are not normally in that category.

It is only right to say that lady drivers generally are the least frequent offenders because ladies do not have the same competitive urge as men have and consequently their accident record is, contrary to public opinion, very much better on a percentage basis than the accident record of men. We men are far too apt to feel insulted if somebody passes us and to swear to ourselves or to those driving with us that we will get that fellow before the next bend or that we will pass him before we get to the next turn. Sometimes I have heard a man say: "I will pass that fellow if it is the last thing I do". Sometimes it is the last thing he does but he also puts an end to somebody else's life at the same time.

Let us get it out of our heads that this Bill is something which will cause intolerable hardship to respectable maiden ladies and beautiful girls. I had a case reported to me only a few days ago by a friend who was driving out of town along the Stillorgan Road. Having passed the TV station at Montrose and the next rather dangerous bend after that, he found himself driving behind a car which was travelling slowly, at approximately 30 miles an hour, although it was a 40 mile an hour area. He attempted to pass the car. It immediatelly swung right across him. He had to fall back. The car then pulled into the left again and he made a second attempt to pass him and once again the car slewed out across his bows. At that stage, he very wisely decided he would make no further efforts to pass but just keep his patience and stay behind.

Another motorist came behind him, passed him, and had precisely the same experience with this slow-moving vehicle going along the dual-carriageway part of the road towards Foster Avenue. Twice or three times attempts were made to pass this slow-moving vehicle and on each occasion the slow vehicle pulled from the left to the right and very nearly caused an accident. The second potential overtaker likewise held his patience and awaited developments.

Shortly after that, the slow-moving car pulled into the left and stopped and the two drivers who had witnessed the standard of driving each pulled in to the left, stopped, had a conference and decided they would investigate the matter further. They found that the driver was slumped across the wheel. She was a lady, and a respectable one driving a respectable car, but she was quite clearly incapable of driving. They roused her and she admitted she had pulled in because she felt she could drive no more. They asked her what had happened and she admitted, rather sleepily, she had been to a party at the Shelbourne Hotel and had had too much. They then tried to find out where she was going and she said she had lost herself because she thought she had taken a wrong turning. After some trouble they found she was trying to reach an address somewhere at the far side of Ballymun. At that stage she was heading towards Bray.

That is the sort of thing which is happening time and again. I was talking to a taximan recently and discussing his hours of work. He said he was getting more and more work late at night and in the early hours of the morning from people who had discovered their own inability to drive home and who had parked their cars and taken a taxi. That is a good sign if there were enough people doing it, but I think there are not half enough people doing that. There are too many people who, out of sheer selfishness or laziness will insist, first, on drinking too much and, secondly, on taking the most incredible risks, both to themselves and other road users, by trying to drive themselves home.

Dealing with the Bill itself, section 12 makes provision for the inspection and examination of vehicles. This is something I welcome. My only criticism is that it does not go nearly far enough. I know, as a matter of my own business, that the condition of many vehicles on the road today is absolutely scandalous. I have reported in this House before cases I have known of vehicles being brought to garages with no brakes at all, where the garage owner is unable to restrain the driver from taking the vehicle out. It is bad enough with a private car, and I have seen them and tested them myself, but I have also seen cases of a heavy commercial vehicle with virtually no braking system in operation. This is partly due to bad maintenance. In some cases it is due just to the age of the vehicle.

Very startling statistics have been produced in Great Britain as a result of the testing system they have there. It is a system which I think is better than ours, but I still think it leaves a lot to be desired. But over there they have produced a horrifying exhibition of vehicles and parts of vehicles which were spotted when State personnel carried out spot checks of vehicles. One that comes most readily to mind is a heavy commercial vehicle which had coil springs. One of the coil springs had broken and this had resulted in the vehicle being rather lopsided. The owner had put the vehicle back on a level keel by inserting a carved wooden piano leg into the end of the coiled spring. That is what this heavy truck was running on.

The only thing we can do is to insist that after a vehicle has been on the road for a certain length of time, it shall not be retaxed until it has been brought to a State-controlled testing station for a complete examination of every part of it. Every part is important — its electrical equipment, lights, horn, windscreen wipers, steering, transmission, brakes, suspension and springing. Also there is the condition of the chassis, which may already have been showing signs of strain and be in danger of a complete fracture. I understand that on the Continent regulations are in force in many countries whereby after a period of two years the vehicle may not be retaxed until it is brought to a testing station for a complete examination. After it has been examined, the State personnel give a list of work which must be carried out and the vehicle may not be driven on the road until that work has been carried out and the vehicle brought back for further inspection.

In Britain they have a situation whereby certificates of roadworthiness may be given by certain approved garages. This, to my mind, is very dangerous. It has already caused trouble. If you leave it in the hands of a private garage owner, you place him in an intolerable position altogether. When an owner brings a vehicle in and says he wishes to have a certificate of roadworthiness, the garage owner will first have to carry out an inspection of the vehicle and tell the owner what work is required to be done before a certificate can be issued. If the garage man does his job properly, he will be under suspicion by the owner that he has made work for himself. There will be certain garage owners who will be tempted to do a cheap job so that they can keep the goodwill of their customers.

This can only be done by State-controlled testing stations. I know that this is a very expensive business, but we are dealing with matters of life and death and I do not think we should allow the financial situation to be the final point on which we reach a decision. I can see that under this Bill it will not be possible to go that far but I would at least ask the Minister to keep that matter in mind because it is something we will have to do sooner or later.

Under Part III of the Bill, I am delighted that the Minister is to take some action as regards controlling the giving of driving instruction for reward. I know there are quite a number of very good driving schools in the city. I also have found from reports given to me by people who have gone to more than one that the instruction given is not uniform. I know one person who was told by an instructor that when she stopped at a road junction where there were traffic lights, she must put the gear in neutral and release the handbrake. She subsequently was unable to carry on with that driving school and went to another instructor who told her that what she had already been told was nonsense, that she should keep the gear in at all times and hold the car on the footbrake. That is the sort of stupid discrepancy which should not be tolerated. We should have a standard code of driving practice and that can only be done if the Minister brings in a definite regulation for the control of driving schools.

I am glad that the question of eyesight is being dealt with. That is a matter of which individuals themselves are not readily aware. We always believe we have excellent eyesight but there are many who may have quite good eyesight for straight ahead but who may have a limited lateral vision and may be slow to see traffic coming from right or left. We have got to regard driving as a professional business and if one is physically incapacitated in any way, one will have to be prohibited from driving. Bad eyesight is thoroughly dangerous.

I approve the provision in Part IV with regard to speed limits but I do not think that speed limits are the general answer to our problem. We have got to make much better provision to make our roads safe at fairly high speeds. We cannot disregard indefinitely the amount of traffic building up on our roads and we are going to find ourselves locked bumper to bumper if we do not produce a better road system, particularly out of Dublin and several other cities. I think the idea of overall speed limits for certain periods of the year is worth considering. It has been tried in other countries with good results. At periods such as Christmas, Easter and summer holiday periods, there is a lot to be said for a top speed limit on all roads not otherwise under restriction.

Now we come to the awkward sections of Part V which appear to worry many people very much. I cannot see any reason why they should. Breathing into a bag is not going to cause anybody undue embarrassment. It is an excellent produce because a person may, because of a momentary lack of concentration, appear to be driving dangerously but if, on a breath test being taken, it is discovered that the driver does not appear to have consumed an undue amount of alcohol, it clears the matter up straight away. Rather than bring everyone to a Garda station, I think it wise to have a preliminary breath test so as to give some idea to the garda as to whether there is a prima facie case against the driver. I do not feel that the breath test is to be regarded as final at this stage but if it gives a dangerous reaction and shows the breath to be alcohol laden, then it is right that the person should be brought to the Garda station for further tests.

It can be embarrassing to some people to have to give a sample of urine on the spot but I do not imagine that anyone would be expected to do that in public. All the things that have been said about the indignity of having to give a sample of blood is nonsense. I have been a blood donor myself for many years and I have seen men and women giving their blood without any trouble. I do not see why anyone should try to work himself up into a frenzy or seek to raise constitutional issues on this point. When we take a car on the road, we are potential murderers and we have to face up to that fact. If we allow our attention to wander for a moment, we may kill ourselves or quite a number of other people.

If we go on the road in such a condition that we are not capable of exercising control over a car, we are damnable criminals and should be treated as such. I have not heard any objections to the method of arrest of persons found breaking into a private house or into a shop. I have not heard people say that we must be gentle with them, that they may be misguided, that we should not inflict indignity on them. If a person is found in such a situation that it appears that he has been engaging in criminal activities, he has nobody to blame but himself. Driving a car in a drunken condition is a highly criminal activity and nothing less. That sort of person has to be put off the road once and for all, if necessary.

We cannot tolerate the present waste of life and the unnecessary suffering to families. If there were the same rate of casualty in industry as there is on the road, there would be a scream for increased safety precautions in all our factories. Somehow we have become so hardened to road casualties that we accept them as part of our ordinary, everyday way of life, on the erroneous assumption that: "It can never happen to me". We fool ourselves on that point. It could happen to me or to any other Member of this House. As drivers, we have got to take every precaution we can to see that we will not be the cause of an accident.

I would be far happier about the general situation of road safety if I felt that this Bill was already an Act and in operation. It may cause inconvenience but it is an inconvenience that must be borne. As long as we regard traffic offences as petty misdemeanours, we are going to cloud the issue. Some traffic offences are petty misdemeanours all right, but many of them are not. I am one hundred per cent behind the Minister in this proposal. I do hope he will not allow himself to be influenced by these highly-coloured descriptions of unlikely events in Garda stations which will cause embarrassment to eminently respectable people. Anyone who is found to be driving dangerously has forfeited his right to be called respectable at all.

There very well may be minor amendments to be made as we go through this measure on Committee Stage, but in principle, I approve of the Bill unreservedly and I hope it will go through as rapidly as possible. There are people who may live a normal life if we pass this Bill, and there are people who will die a premature death if we delay too long in debating it or in putting it into operation.

Mr. Moore

The explanatory memorandum to this measure may sound like wishful thinking when it includes among the Bill's main objects the following:

(a) to ensure a higher standard of roadworthiness of vehicles and their equipment and to improve the effectiveness of enactments protecting public roads from damage;

(b) to secure better standards of driving and driving instruction.

However, I believe the Minister has brought in a very good weapon indeed in order, as Deputy Booth has said, to give people a chance of living. We face with some complacency the fact that over 300 people a year are killed on the roads, not taking into account the thousands who are maimed. We are living in a society where each year the number of vehicles increases and where, as we go towards a more affluent society, more people can afford cars. Therefore our roads will become even more dangerous than they are now unless we take stringent measures to bring some sense of responsibility to many of the road users.

I do not hold that motorists are always to blame; most people in the country are pedestrians at some time, but taking pedestrians, cyclists and motorists, all road users, together, they make the roads a pretty grim place to try to travel on. There is just no one solution to this problem. We can point to some of the continental countries where they have massive road systems and a frightfully high casualty rate on the roads. One would often wonder why this should be if they have perfect roads and traffic regulations and every other precaution is taken to ensure safety.

I do not want to sound puritanical but there is a moral question involved. Very few of our people would set out to rob a neighbour or by their carelessness set their neighbour's house on fire, but on the roads it is different. In a 30-mile-an-hour speed limit zone such as College Green, one can see cars and particularly motorcycles travelling around by Trinity College at frightful speeds. There is no use in blaming the Guards. They cannot chase everyone who breaks the law. They can catch only the occasional offender and make him pay the penalty so that it will be a deterrent to him and others in the future.

The proposals in the Bill have been criticised, and will be, but I hope the Minister will stick to the proposals he has outlined, as I feel he will. This Bill gives an opportunity of taking death off the road to a great extent. Walking around the city any day of the week one can see vehicles parked and double parked so as to constitute a danger in the streets. There is an attitude adopted by some motorists that because they are paying road tax, they are entitled to flout the law. Footpaths are being used for car parking. Some motorists park on corners and anywhere at all. This may be the fault of the local authority, which does not provide adequate car parking spaces, but even where they are provided, if they are not right outside the place where the motorist wants to do business, meet a friend or do anything else, he will not take the trouble to go to the car park and walk or take a bus to his final destination.

In the city especially, very stringent measures will have to be taken against motorists and road users in general. There is the problem of the increase in the number of vehicles each year. We can see the time coming when, as motor cars become cheaper, as we are promised, the increase in the number of vehicles will pose an even greater problem for us, so that it may be necessary, apart from issuing a road licence, to put people on a priority list before they can get a car, like waiting for a telephone. The scarcity in this case is road space and parking places. Our city was not built to take twentieth century traffic, and we are inhibited by the fact that the local authority has not the money to build super highways and provide all the parking lots we need.

The question of drunken driving is a very big one, and I support the Minister's proposals in this regard. We will get the usual argument trotted out that what the Minister proposes is an infringement of personal rights. Surely one of the fundamental rights is that a person may walk, cycle or even drive along a road with some degree of safety offered to him. If this right were recognised by all, we would not have the dreadful toll, year after year, of people killed or maimed through sheer carelessness. If a person is convicted of driving while drunk, even if he does not injure a fellow citizen, he should be prohibited for life from driving again.

Our ambition must be to attain the greatest possible margin of safety on our roads. Every day there are flagrant violation of our road traffic laws. On building sites, one sees huge trucks pulling out, loaded with debris not properly covered. Dust blows all over the place and very often obscures the vision of other drivers with the result that these may crash or knock someone down. We should try to get away from the stupid idea that we are divided into certain classes and that motorists are at liberty to do as they like. They are not. Urban motorists in particular have an obligation on them to realise that there are certain disciplines they must practise, remembering that all our citizens have the same fundamental rights.

With regard to the efficiency of vehicles, I have been told that new cars can be defective. In one particular car there was a very serious flaw in the steering column. Luckily the owner discovered it before there was a serious accident. It is disconcerting to discover that a car can be sold in such a defective condition. That driver, had he not discovered the defect, might have killed some old person not quick enough to get out of his way or small children going to school.

Young people can hire cars too easily. Very often they hire them to go on an outing or to a dance. Naturally they are full of the joys of life. It is then the tragedies occur.

The introduction of driving tests must have led to a reduction in the number of accidents and the new proposals here should result in safer roads for all. The breathaliser test will be resisted, of course, but I believe the number who will have to take the test will be small. The test is essential to make sure we do everything we can to make people realise the obligations they have when driving cars, riding bicycles, or even walking on the roads. There is a moral obligation on all road users to use the roads with responsibility. When a person is sentenced for breaking traffic laws, thought is always had for his wife and children when he goes to jail. Imagine the heartbreak of a parent whose child is killed by some careless motorist. I am always amazed that we have not had more counsel from the churches in regard to this matter. Why do people turn into maniacs when they get behind the wheels of cars? The better the road the greater the speed and the bigger the risk they take.

The roads in our city are as good as those in comparable cities elsewhere, but we will have to improve them considerably. Here, again, it is a question of money. I hope the Minister for finance will have some big sums for road improvement in this city in his forthcoming Budget. It is true, as has been said on occasion, that we have no fly-overs. There are proposals for major roadways leading to and from the city and it is hoped these will help to reduce the accident rate. At the same time, we must face the fact that in the next three years the number of vehicles on the road will increase tenfold. How will we cope with that situation? At the moment over 300 people a year are killed on our roads. What will the situation be when the number of vehicles increases?

I should like to say something now about the careless pedestrian. At any city crossing one sees pedestrians showing both suicidal and homicidal tendencies rushing across in front of oncoming traffic. I have a great admiration for bus drivers. Theirs is a desperate task, trying to keep time schedules without being involved in accidents. They get very little cooperation from pedestrians. Where Nelson Pillar used to be, one sees people ignoring the lights installed for their safety, trying to rush across before oncoming traffic. I do not blame the motorist for all the accidents. One sees elderly people ignoring the lights. One sees mothers with young children ignoring the lights. What is the use trying to train children in road safety? These mothers rush across with their children and only the expertise of the motorist prevents a veritable holocaust.

Unless adequate steps are taken we will never reduce the road toll. In fact, we may even fail to keep it at its present level. The roadworthiness of vehicles is very important. Constant checks are essential. During safety week some garages checked cars free. I think we will eventually come to the stage when the checking of cars will be a public service; a certificate of roadworthiness could be issued.

With regard to the retreading of tyres, there are some competent firms engaged in that business here. If tyres are in poor condition and the brakes have to be applied quickly, the wheels will not grip the road and a very serious accident can occur. In the last year there have been some dreadful accidents. There should be some research into why accidents happen so frequently at certain places to discover whether it is the roads that are at fault or the motorist. Really we are only making a start in this Bill, a beginning to all we will have to do in future years to make our roads safe.

I do not think anything in the Bill could be taken as an infringment of personal rights. It has to be realised that when the motor car was first invented, it was meant to be a benefit to mankind, just as the the aeroplane was, but when people use planes to drop bombs, it is difficult to convince the less intelligent that they are still a help to mankind and if a car is a weapon by which people are killed on the road, it is difficult to convince people that there is not a case for stringently limiting their use. There would be a great outcry if any government tried to do that but if any government stands by and sees 300 of its citizens killed and hundreds more maimed, it would be failing in its duty if it did not try to deal with that situation.

In conclusion, I wish to congratulate the Minister on the Bill and I hope that it will be enacted quickly with its existing provisions. At least we can say that we are showing concern for the hundreds who died last year and for the hundreds who will die this year and in the following years unless we take drastic action not only against erring motorists but against erring cyclists and pedestrians.

Mr. M.J. O'Higgins

Possibly I misunderstood Deputy Moore's remarks when he was concluding, and I hope I did, because no matter what side of the House we are on, there is some obligation on all Deputies to be particularly careful to ensure that legislation we are enacting does not infringe the ordinary basic human rights of individuals except in the clear category of cases where restrictions or interference with those rights are considered essential in the common good. I take it that Deputy Moore's references to the question of personal integrity and personal rights and to the possibility of interfering with them are intended to be related only to the category of cases where the common good seems to make it incumbent that this interference should take place.

Discussion of this Bill largely centred around the sections which contain the Government's provisions for dealing with the menace of the drunken driver and it is natural that that should be so. I imagine that all Deputies will agree that strong measures are needed to deal with this problem but however strong the measures taken, I do not think we can just go overboard on the subject. There is a problem and it is a menacing problem and a problem the Government for the time being must deal with. I fully subscribe to that view but I do not at all subscribe to it in the sense of feeling that in order to deal with the menacing problem, which, as I say, is there, we should completely disregard questions of individual human rights. I am not suggesting that in this measure the Government are completely disregarding human rights but it is proper that the particular sections dealing with this question, dealing with breathaliser tests, with blood tests and urine tests, should be submitted to very careful scrutiny by the House.

My view on this question—in fact, the descriptive phrase "slaughter on the roads" has become practically a cliché because of common usage—and I think I am right in this, is that no matter what laws we pass, no matter what legislation we enact, fundamentally the important thing is that every individual road user, whether motorist, cyclist or pedestrian, must have a sense of personal responsibility for his actions when using the road. Unless we can instil that sense of personal responsibility in road usersa great many of them have it—unless we can get general recognition of the necessity for this sense of personal responsibility, then no matter what laws we enact, we are not going to get any dramatic reduction in the number of road accidents.

I hold the view that every person who uses the public roads, whether a pedestrian or the driver of a motor vehicle or a pedal cycle or any other conveyance, has a responsibility to every other user of the road and that it is only by constantly reminding ourselves of the necessity not only for courtesy but care in using the roads, particularly at busy times and on busy roads, that we are going to make any impression on this problem of road accidents. As I said, I think it right that the House should submit certain sections of the Bill to a very close and careful scrutiny. Deputy Fitzpatrick and others raised some general matters on this Stage and the proper occasion for the detailed scrutiny I am talking about probably is the Committee State rather than the Second Reading. However, my thoughts are related chiefly to these sections and for that reason I propose to refer to them now.

One of the main features of this Bill is that it proposes to create a statutory offence if a particular minimum quantity of alcohol in the blood is exceeded in the case of any individual who is driving a motor car or other motor vehicle. I do not claim to be an authority on this subject but I understand that the allowance being permitted in the Bill is, by standards applied in some other countries, a generous allowance, but I do query the wisdom of making any particular quantity of alcohol in the blood an automatic and absolute statutory offence as appears to be done in this Bill.

As I understand the position, the Commission which examined the problem of driving under the influence of drink made a clear recommendation that a particular minimum quantity of alcohol in the blood which could be measured should be regarded not as an absolute offence but as prima facie evidence of a person's inability to drive because of the consumption of alcohol. The Minister apparently has not accepted the point of view of the Commission in that regard, and instead of providing that a particular minimum quantity of alcohol in the blood shall be prima facie evidence of incapacity to drive on account of drink, he has chosen to provide in section 28 for a particular quantity. He has provided in the Bill that once there are 125 milligrammes of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood it becomes automatically an offence.

I can appreciate to some extent the reasoning behind that proposal. Obviously it makes matters a lot easier for the authorities. If evidence can be given that a particular level of alcohol in the blood has been exceeded, and that evidence can be given to the court, obviously it is much easier for the authorities and much easier to secure a conviction. It is simply a question of measurement. The measurement is there; evidence of that can be given; and a conviction will follow automatically.

Many people will feel that the Minister should not be faulted for adopting that point of view, and that something stringent and dramatic is necessary to reduce the incidence of accidents occurring by reason of drink. On the other hand, I think it is true to say that different individuals can react differently so far as alcohol is concerned, and that even though the particular allowance permitted by the Bill may be generous, you cannot say with any certainty that all individuals are drunk —even drunk in the statutory sense provided in the Bill—when their alcohol content exceeds what is permitted.

The main point is that the Commission sat and studied this question very seriously, at some length, and reported their findings to the Government. They made a particular recommendation which presumably satisfied the members of the Commission who had considered the matter thoroughly. Their recommendation was that instead of being an absolute offence, the alcohol level in the blood should simply be prima facie evidence of drunkenness, that is, drunkenness in the sense we are talking about in relation to this Bill. The Minister should make it very clear to the House when he is concluding what his reasons were, and what the Governments reasons were, for rejecting that proposal and deciding to opt for making it an absolute offence.

With regard to the section dealing with the breathaliser test and the blood and urine tests, several questions also arise. So far as I can see—and I think I am correct in this—refusal to take a breathaliser test again is made an absolute offence under the Bill. Speaking personally, for the life of me I cannot see any reason other than a guilty reason why a person should refuse to take a breathaliser test. However, in certain cases there may be perfectly valid reasons. Personally I cannot think of them, but if there should be valid reasons for refusing, it is a bit dangerous simply by an Act of Parliament to make a person's refusal to take a breathaliser test absolute evidence, consequent on which penalties are going to be imposed.

Between this stage and Committee Stage, the Minister should consider the possibility of writing in some saving provision in the Bill which would provide—something on the same lines as he has adopted in relation to the blood test—that where for special and substantial reasons the court finds a refusal justified, that is a good defence. There should not be any question in those circumstances of an offence being committed. That is a matter that the Minister should consider. The penalties provided in section 29 (3) for a person who refuses to take a blood test under that section are extremely heavy. I am aware of the fact that in the course of the Bill it is provided that while refusal to allow a blood test to be taken falls into the category of an absolute offence, there is a saving provision such as I am talking about in section 35 which provides:

(1) In a prosecution for refusing or failing to permit a designated registered medical practitioner to take a specimen of blood, it shall be a good defence for the defendant-

(a) to show that, when required to permit the taking of the specimen, he had not been cautioned in the prescribed terms of the possible effects of his refusal or failure, of

(b) to satisfy the court that there was a special and substantial reason for his refusal or failure.

Nevertheless, I think some uneasiness has been ceated by the manner in which these particular aspects are dealt with in the Bill. When the Minister is replying, I hope he will go very fully into the reasons which motivated the Government to opt for these measures and this type of legislation with regard to the breathaliser test and the blood and urine test.

The only other matter to which I want to refer is one which has also been referred to here already, that is, the provision in this Bill which is designed to restore to the Minister for Justice the power to interfere with the suspension of a driving licence. Possibly there has been some misunderstanding about this. Some people seem to have read the Bill as giving the Minister for Justice power to interfere with any suspension of a driving licence imposed by the courts, including a case where the suspension is automatic, as for example, in a case of drunken driving. Of course that is not so, as I understand the Bill.

In effect, what is happening is that the Government are proposing that the Minister for Justice should have power to restore driving licences in cases where the suspension of the driving licence is a discretionary penalty which has been imposed by the court. Notwith standing the fact that the proposal in the Bill does not go as far as some people may have thought, nevertheless it does seem to be very undesirable and a rather retrograde step that, within five or six years of that particular power being taken away from the Minister, the Government should now propose its restoration.

Again, I can see the arguments pro and con in this. I can see that an argument can be made that a particular case or some cases of a definite miscarriage of justice might occur and this might not be ascertained until the resources of the court had been exhausted and, for that reason, there should be a residual power vested in the Minister for Justice to remedy the miscarriage of justice and to restore the driving licence, but, on balance, I think that that possibility is so slight as not to warrant serious consideration by this House.

After all, if a licence is suspended by one court, an appeal can lie to the next court and the defendant whose licence has been suspended will have the opportunity of a rehearing. If he has in any way slipped with regard to the presentation of his evidence in the lower court, he will have a further opportunity in the higher court to remedy the error. The danger of a miscarriage of justice being perpetrated in a lower court and being furthered in a higher court seems to be very slight. Consequently, on that particular basis, I do not think that this proposal to restore these powers to the Minister can be justified.

I understand that the real argument in favour of this proposal is as follows. In a certain number of cases where a conviction is made in a lower court and part of the penalty imposed by the court is the suspension of the driving licence, in some cases the district justice refuses to lift that suspension pending an appeal being made to a higher court and a situation can arise that the appeal goes on but the unfortunate defendant is, in the meanwhile, without the authority to drive his car because his licence has been suspended. Then, when the matter comes to the appeal court, the conviction is reversed. A situation then arises where a person has, on appeal, been found innocent and been found subject to no penalty whatever but has, in fact, at that time suffered the penalty of the suspension from the time of the original District Court hearing to the time of the Circuit Court appeal. I can appreciate that kind of argument.

Deputy Fitzpatrick of Cavan pointed out very strongly that surely such a situation can be remedied quite simply by providing that, where the suspension of a driving licence has been imposed by the district justice, and where an appeal is taken, the suspension should automatically be lifted pending the hearing of the appeal. That would completely remove the type of difficulty I have referred to and the type of difficulty which, I understand, is the basis of the Government's recommendation of the restoration of this power to the Minister.

From the point of view of the Minister for Justice, I should like to know from the Minister for Local Government whether or not the Minister for Justice or the Department of Justice have urged that this power should be restored. It seems to me that it is not a move than any Minister for Justice would welcome. At the moment, the Minister for Justice at least has the protection and the buffer against pressure that he cannot interfere, that only the courts can restore the licence and that he cannot do it. If this power is restored to him, as the Government now suggest we should do, the Minister for Justice will be open to the full force of pressure on him to restore driving licences.

When a petition is made to the Minister for Justice, I have no doubt he makes his inquiries from the Garda and through the courts and gets his reports in order to enable him to assess the situation and to come to a decision on it. However, he will not be in the same position, or in anything like the same position, as the judge or the justice hearing the case, seeing the witnesses, hearing the evidence, able to make up his mind, from seeing and hearing the witnesses and from the evidence given, on an appropriate penalty. If, in these cases, where a court has discretion to impose what is very often the harshest penalty that can be imposed, the suspension of the driving licence, if a court in that position, able to hear the evidence at first hand, able to see all the witnesses concerned, able to have the full facts threshed out before the court, and if, in that situation, the court decides to use its discretion and to impose as part of the penalty a suspension of the driving licence, it seems to me that any Minister should be very slow to interfere if he had the power to interfere and it would seem to me that it would be the desire of a Minister not to have the power to interfere and not to be subject to the kind of pressure to which he may be subject if that power is there.

In any event, in so far as any substantial argument exists on this, it is only on the basis of protecting the person who has had his licence suspended wrongly and who subsequently has his position vindicated on appeal and who, in the meanwhile, between the hearing of the case initially and the hearing of the appeal, has been at the loss of his licence. That situation can be dealt with amply by the suggestion made by Deputy Fitzpatrick that there should be this automatic lifting of the suspension pending appeal.

I would strongly urge the Minister between now and Committee Stage to give very careful consideration to that suggestion. I do not know whether the Minister is aware of it but I think it is true to say that there is no section of the Bill that has aroused greater misgiving and unease in the minds of the public than this section whereby the Government seek to restore that power to the Minister for Justice. I appreciate the reasons advanced for it but it does seem to me to be unnecessary and I would ask the Minister to reconsider it very carefully.

Mr. Dowling

I want to say that I fully subscribe to the Bill as presented by the Minister. There are three main factors in the Bill: the person, the vehicle and the services provided, each of which is of equal importance and should receive the same detailed consideration.

First of all, in connection with the person, we hear a great deal about the rights of the person who is questioned or apprehended because of drunken driving. I fully subscribe to the section in the Bill and all the implications of the Bill dealing with this matter. A motor car is a lethal weapon in the hands of a drunken driver. Many drunken drivers have no regard for other users of the road. For that reason the law in respect of them should be applied in full so that people will be able to move about in a reasonable manner with reasonable safety and that this hazard that has cost the lives of so many, recorded and unrecorded, will be removed. Possibly many of the hit-and-run accidents occur as a result of drunken driving and drivers leave the scene of the accident because of fear of conviction of drunken driving.

Whatever the consequences and whatever the demands may be, every effort should be made to ensure that persons who are apprehended will be prepared to meet whatever type of test may be applied. The right of the ordinary citizen who walks along the road and crosses the road or uses a bicycle in a responsible manner has to be considered. In many parts of the country where there are licensed premises which are open to a late hour which attract various groups, the roads are a hazard at night. In many cases quite convenient to where I live a responsible parent would not allow his children to be on the road at night because of the traffic there. In places perhaps removed some distance from a town groups of one type or another, beat groups, are attracted to a particular sector and there is a large accumulation of people who drink until closing time and then rush out along the roads, without regard for other users of the road and probably, in many instances, full up with drink. Whatever tests are required should be rigidly applied.

The question of the vehicle is of great importance. At present cars are done up by groups who spring up for the purpose of selling cars and very soon afterwards substantial defects are found, possibly in the steering and the brakes, but by the time the purchaser calls to complain the group has disappeared. A certificate of roadworthiness would be necessary and desirable, just as aircraft have to have a certificate of airworthiness. It is essential that in the case of used cars a certificate of roadworthiness should be demanded so that any car that is on the road will be in a reasonable condition and, from the point of view of steering, tyres, lighting and so on, will conform fully with the law. I hope the Minister will give full consideration to the question of used cars. Possibly that could be dealt with by licensing the sale of used cars so that only those people who act in a responsible manner and give a reasonable service will be allowed to sell them. That is a matter that is worthy of consideration.

Then there is the question of the services provided by local authorities. Many roadways are unsuitable for speeding traffic. Nevertheless one sees "no speed limit" signs which indicate to the driver that he can put down his foot. It is accepted that when one passes a "no speed limit" sign, one can drive as fast as one likes, irrespective of the condition of the road and that one is within the law. Some fresh thinking must be done on the question of the roads. Where "no speed limit" is indicated, the roads should be serviced properly so as to meet the requirements. In many cases the local authorities have not measured up to their responsibility in this matter. Whether the responsibility rests with the central authority or the local authority, it must be discharged.

On the question of drugs, drugs are being prescribed and dispensed that have a far more dangerous effect than drink. In some cases the drugs are prescribed for the prevention of blackouts. I know a driver who has to take drugs every time he gets into a car in order to prevent a blackout. This is a very serious situation which requires detailed attention. It is a question of how far one can go. I understand that in this case the drug prevents the blackout but makes the person drowsy. New thinking will have to be done on the question of drugs taken on prescription or as "shots" and which are being doled out in some parts of the city from time to time.

The question of the driving licence is also of great importance. Prior to the introduction of the compulsory test, there were queues ranging from one-quarter to one-half mile on many occasions outside the motor tax office when persons were getting driving licences in advance of the period when tests would be compulsory. I am quite sure that there are statistics to show the large number of driving licences that have been issued to persons who have not yet used them, some of them in no fit condition to drive cars. These people are now legally empowered to drive a car which is taxed and insured.

We should look into the case of people with severe physical defects who have obtained driving licences but who are not using them and are keeping them for a time when they may have a car. I understand it was mainly people with defects who applied for licences before the test was compulsory, people who felt they would never pass a driving test but who obtained permission to drive. They are as dangerous as the person who drives under the influence of drugs or drink. Unless the driving licence already issued is for a disabled person's vehicle, some checks should be made from time to time to ensure that these people are physically able to drive.

Mention has been made of tyres and other factors. I fully subscribe to the provisions of the Bill, particularly in relation to tests to ensure that a person is fit to drive. I feel it will have an effect on those people who drive under the influence without regard for anyone else, whose main concern is to get home as quickly as they can after a heavy night's drinking so as to ensure they are not long enough on the road to be caught. I hope this Bill will be the answer to the problem. The rights of drivers and individual road users are important. We should not make it easy for one person and leave the other person to the hazards of the road. We should make it as difficult as possible for people who drive under the influence of drink and drugs, particularly those who drive away after an accident.

Mr. Lyons

I am sure every aspect of this Bill has been covered by the legal gentlemen on both sides of the House, who will probably make a large part of their salaries from debating the various sections in the courts, I want to make a few general remarks from the point of view of the man in the street. The Minister is to be complimented on introducing this Bill. We all know there is a necessity to introduce a measure to attempt to prevent the appalling casualties caused in various ways on the roads of Ireland today.

While there may be arguments as to whether or not the amount of alcohol consumed in a certain length of time will register on the apparatus called the breathaliser in such a manner as to make a man guilty or whether the fact of a man walking straight out of his house after a glass of brandy will register in a greater fashion than if he waited for half an hour and then went out are questions which I am not competent to answer and questions which, it unfortunately appears, nobody is competent to answer. The man in the street is asking: "Is this apparatus foolproof?" If it is going to result in a man committing an offence by refusing to take this breathaliser test, it is necessary that this apparatus should be foolproof and above suspicion. I am sure those factors have already been discussed by many speakers.

There are many other factors besides drunken driving that possibly have not been emphasised as much as they should. Drunken driving appears to be the major offence, the one that carries the greater ignominy in this country. Unfortunately, we have not statistics to tell us whether drunks are mainly responsible for the accidents that occur on our highways. We know that district justices impose various penalties for various offences under the Road Traffic Act. One man decides that the fellow with bald tyres is the one who should be put off the road. A guard finds a stationary car with bald tyres and the owner is heavily fined. Some of the guards in the district love to have a crop of bald tyres for this man when he comes down. He feels he is doing an excellent job by cutting out every fellow on the road with bald tyres. It has never been statistically proved that any certain percentage of accidents is caused by bald tyres. Until we can arrive at the stage where we have statistical information about every accident, whether it is caused by drunken driving, defects of eyesight or reflexes or other physical defects or whether it is caused by bald tyres or bad brakes — until we arrive at that stage nobody will be able to say with confidence that drunken driving is the worst type of offence or that accidents were caused purely because a person had consumed a certain amount of alcohol. I know that the Bill, when tested over a period of years, will give certain results. There is, of course, always the possibility that any Act can be amended if certain sections do not achieve their purposes.

I think Deputy Dowling said there should be some test of cars sold to the public. Nobody should be allowed to sell a car with defective brakes, dangerous tyres or other mechanical defects. The Minister might examine this and see that some standards are laid down to prevent the sale of secondhand cars which are not roadworthy and which may be a danger to other road users as well as the people who drive in them.

Another matter which should be tackled on a national basis is the question of roadsigns and roadlining. By road signs, I mean those that tell about hazards on the roads. I am not talking about directional signs at the moment. In some counties you find that wherever there is a hazard, whether it is a narrow bridge or a greasy stretch of road, they are very well covered, but in other counties they are not so well covered. Some standard should be prescribed so that where hazards exist, there will be some competent authority to decide on the type of sign, the distance it should be from the hazard and also the colour and type of paint to be used. That is something we can do inside our own country. I know the international signs here and in Europe are good in their own way, but there are hazards they cannot deal with, such as hazards caused by work in progress on a road or where oil is spilled on a road as a result of some accident. Where you have very twisty roads you cannot put up the ordinary type of sign. Such sign cannot be seen by the motorist at night because it must be above the line of light as well as other factors.

A circular should be issued to county councils explaining the difficulties and telling them that the Minister has adopted certain standards and that he expects them to keep to these standards. The centre lining of roads is being neglected and the Minister should compel every county council to line its roads wherever there are bends, corners or any hazards that lining would help to eliminate. It is long past time that these things were done.

I suspect that if we had statistics in respect of the causes of accidents, we would find that a great many people who are driving suffer from bad eyesight. This is dangerous particularly at night where you have the glare of lights and boorish individuals who insist on going on, first, after dimming their lights and then switching on full lights. Regulations with regard to lights on cars should be drawn up and strictly enforced. These should have regard to the type of light, the manner in which it is mounted on the car and also to dimming which is very important. There should also be some penalty for people who refuse to dim.

I know the Minister is attempting to do his best to ensure that this legislation will be used for the safety of drivers and also for the safety of all users of the road and the public at large. I do not make any excuse for the drunken driver — there is no excuse that can be made — but I think that until we have statistical evidence as to the cause of accidents, so that we can pinpoint the reason for them, we will never tackle this problem in a proper manner.

Some speakers in this debate mentioned the delay in driving tests. There is considerable delay which should not be allowed to continue any longer. Today a motor car is a necessity for many workers. It is no longer a status symbol and it is wrong that a person, when he buys a car to take him to his work, should find that it may be a year before he can get a second test. It seems in practice that a person, aspiring to drive has to stand at least three tests. In order to avoid this, many additional inspectors should be employed to get over the backlog of people waiting impatiently to be told about the day when they may enter the ratrace on the roads of Ireland.

I do not have anything more to say on this matter except to appeal to the Minister to do the thing that can easily be done with the county councils, to see that the road signs are properly located, that the lines on the roads are properly put down and I would also appeal to the Minister to be charitable to all offenders but also to ensure that no killer will be allowed to continue to drive on our roads.

Mr. Molloy

I feel obliged to speak briefly on some matters in this Bill which have caused some concern in my constituency. The Bill deals mainly with proposals to meet the problem of the drunken driver. Like Deputy Lyons, I will accept the Bill in good faith and reserve my judgement until I see it in operation for a year. It is not easy for the ordinary layman to understand the working of the breathaliser test and so we will wait to see how it does work, but I would appeal to the Minister to keep the matter under close surveillance for the next 12 months to see how it will affect the ordinary rights of the individual which we always wish to protect. We are now interfering with these rights only in the interests of the common good.

One matter which has puzzled me is that of speed limits. With the passage of time, more and more legislation will be introduced in efforts to stop the accidents which are causing so much death and sorrow in our country. The number of statutes and regulations with this purpose in mind is growing and will continue to grow. When speed limits were first introduced, they were welcomed and it was recognised at that time that they would have to be reviewed from time to time but it is strange that it should have taken two years to make certain changes in the speed limits in Galway. The last time the signs were moved was in June, 1965.

Part of the anxiety which has caused me to speak here today has been stilled by the intervention of the Minister for Local Government who, this morning, told me that he is going to use his power to have the speed limit signs which caused so much anxiety in Galway resited. These speed signs led to another serious accident recently resulting in the death of a young man and I am grateful to the Minister for acting so quickly. I understand the position will be rectified on 14th April and I hope the Minister will see that this will be done. It is strange that the Department, which has shown its interest and goodwill in helping to keep road accidents to a minimum, should take two years to make these changes, despite the constant agitation for them. It does not seem in character that the Department should have taken so long to deal with the matter and I trust that in future they will be quicker off the mark. I wish to thank the Minister for the action he has taken in this very serious matter which affects so many of my constituents.

Another matter in which I am interested is the use of safety belts. In Britain they have introduced a law which makes it compulsory on everybody to fit safety belts but I can see that it would be difficult to make it compulsory to use these belts. At least it goes part of the way to ensuring that each car will be fitted with this very essential mechanism. It strikes me as rather strange in regard to our State cars that the Minister has a safety belt but that the driver is not provided with one. The Minister for Local Government might look into this and give equal protection to the drivers of our State cars who have such an important function to carry out, sometimes in the most trying conditions, driving long journeys and having very little sleep on some occasions.

I would suggest to the Minister that possibly the next legislation he might introduce to minimise death on the roads and to make our roads safer is to make compulsory the installation of safety belts in motor cars. I am certain the House would give the introduction of such legislation every support.

I should also like to suggest the introduction of a national speed limit of 60 miles an hour after lighting-up time. Deputy Lyons referred to statistics of accidents, of which there are not very many; nevertheless, it can be easily proved that the vast majority of serious accidents take place after lighting-up time. Although I would be slow to recommend a national speed limit, as has been mentioned by some, I certainly would not hesitate to recommend that it be operated after lighting-up time, which is the time when there is most danger on the roads, when headlamps have to be used and when there are headlamps facing the motorist, and some drivers are careless about dimming their lights which has been the cause of many accidents.

Another factor which I feel contributes to the terrible slaughter on the roads is something which seems to be introduced in this country more and more, that is, the laying of this carpet roadway known as tarmacadam. Galway County Council are using it extensively. The main road from Galway to Dublin is getting a major repair at the moment and this is the type of surface that is being put down. This surface is all right after being laid and possibly for some years, but then it becomes a terribly even, fine surface which if it collects any small amount of water, as any experienced driver will tell you, will very easily send a car spinning within its own distance, because there is no grip on the surface once it gets wet. I do not agree with the use of this type of road. I prefer the old road with the chips which provide a greater hold on the road for cars. This is a matter to which a lot of attention has not been paid. We have engineers to go into these problems and I would request that special attention be paid to the hazard this tarmacadam carpet, as it is called, becomes after three or four years of use.

On the question of remould and retread tyres, I understand that in the United States the sale of such tyres is banned. I shall never again use them on my car because from my experience of them, I know they are not safe; they are liable to blow up without any warning because their life has been well spent. It is no saving to the motorist to use remould or retread tyres. There should be some investigation into this whole question in order to see whether this might contribute to some of our accidents, and especially to find out why it was found necessary in the USA to ban the sale of these articles. Maybe it would be a good thing if we introduced the same type of legislation in this country.

The introduction of the driving test was welcomed by the country generally, but with the passage of time one sees some snags in it. One of these small things, which nevertheless is causing great inconvenience in my constituency is the fact that the only centre in the constituency of West Galway in which one can have a driving test in the city of Galway. As we know, this is a constituency which stretches 50, 60, and 70 miles in places. I would suggest to the Minister the setting up of a driving test centre in the town of Clifden or some other suitable location to serve the whole of Connemara. It is very difficult for a man who is living in the rural areas and who must purchase a car to bring him to his work to have a driving test in these circumstances. Most of such men who are able to get employment cannot always find it on their doorstep. If they require a motor car to get to work and if they are working five days of the week, they cannot do the test.

I have made representations to the Minister's office on certain occasions to try to facilitate people who are working during the hours they were being requested to do the test. I am afraid that they were not met in any way and they were forced eventually into taking a day off from their labour and losing a day's wages, which is not a very fair thing to ask a man who is rearing a family of seven or eight children in the heart of Connemara. It would be reasonable to expect that the driving tester could attend in the town of Clifden on certain occasions, possibly once every two or three months.

As I said in the outset, I feel very strongly about the Department's delay in dealing with obvious problems, hazards to life. I know these conditions exist in areas other than Galway. We still have very well-known driving hazards where people have lost their lives and where accidents are taking place week after week. Especially coming into the tourist season, when there will be many motorists passing through our towns and along our roads, we cannot but expect, unfortunately, that there will be more accidents in certain areas. These problems have been well aired by me and by other people in other places and at other times; yet no action seems to be taken. Greater and more rapid attention to the more obvious danger spots would be greatly appreciated by the general public.

In supporting this Bill, I would urge that the situation be reviewed after 12 months and that we get an opportunity of discussing it again, knowing how the legislation has worked out. I congratulate the Minister on taking this forward step. I trust some of the improvements I have suggested will be adopted and will be embodied in legislation at some later stage. I do not wish to choke up the country with laws and regulations but we have a moral obligation to do the best we can to protect life and to make our roads safe for our people to travel on.

Minister for Local Government (Mr. Boland)

I am glad to say that there was general agreement on the purposes of the Bill, and, indeed, I think I can also say on the main principles of the Bill. I was obviously right in my opening statement in assuming that the provisions in the Bill dealing with the consumption of alcohol by drivers would figure most prominently in the debate here on Second Reading. Deputy Larkin, usefully and appropriately, prefaced his remarks by pointing out that, even if we were to succeed in eliminating this contributory cause of accidents on the roads, it would not prove to be a cure-all for the problem of accidents on our roads. With this, I, of course, agree. There are many other factors which cause or contribute to accidents but the consumption of alcohol by a driver has in it some degree of culpability; the consumption of alcohol can easily be avoided and it is reasonable to insist that it must be avoided.

Accidents arising from other causes within the control of the driver are usually due to some momentary failure or some indecision on the part of the driver. An accident caused or contributed to by drink happens, however, because at some time prior to the accident, the driver concerned decided to take the risk of impairing his proficiency as a driver by the consumption of alcohol. The community, individual members of which are endangered by decisions such as that, is entitled, I think to insist that such risks should not be taken. Unlike accidents which are caused by other factors, accidents which are caused or contributed to by the consumption of alcohol can be avoided and, as a Legislature, it is our duty to provide that they must be avoided.

We must, of course, deal as far as it is possible to do so with other causes of accidents. I suppose some momentary aberrations are inevitable, but these other causes of accidents are in a different category from driving when affected, however slightly, by the consumption of alcohol. I agree with Deputy Larkin, however, that we must do everything possible to avoid all accidents. Even if it is a fact that world statistics tend to show that accidents and fatalities on the roads are, in general, proportionate to the level of traffic, that does not mean that we must accept that it is inevitable that the number of accidents must go on increasing. We must adhere to the belief that all accidents can be avoided and we must try to ensure, so far as it is possible for us to do so, that they will be avoided.

We have no cause to be complacent or to congratulate ourselves if our accident rate happens to be lower than that in other countries. We must believe that, if all drivers exercise proper control over their vehicles, there will be no serious accidents at all. Given the goodwill of the people, this should be an attainable target. If it appears to be unattainable, then that is a reflection on our own attitude. We must not get into the position of accepting that road accidents are inevitable.

Deputy de Valera asked two specific questions. The first was: Is drinking before driving so big a problem that this Bill is needed now? He pointed out that other things may be more important contributing factors or there may be other factors which cause more accidents than does the consumption of alcohol. That may be so. There are many other factors contributing to accidents on the roads and I have no doubt that some of them probably contribute more to accidents than does drink. We must, as I said, try to deal with this problem as well as we possibly can.

Many of the other factors were referred to, such as the mechanical and otherwise general roadworthiness of vehicles, wandering animals, tiredness on the part of drivers, the state of the driver's mind when he may be affected by business or domestic worries, what Deputy Larkin referred to as the transformation of character which takes place in some people when they get behind the wheel of a car and even such comparatively small sources of distraction as advertising signs and car radios. All these can provide sufficient distraction to take a driver's attention off the road for a split second, not to mention another matter referred to here by several speakers, namely, driving at a speed which is excessive in the particular circumstances.

Most of these contributing factors arise from momentary loss of concentration or some inadvertence on the part of the driver but the consumption of alcohol involves a definite decision by the driver. In answer then to Deputy de Valera's question as to whether this is so big a problem that this Bill is necessary, my reply is definitely "Yes". The danger to the public is of sufficient magnitude to warrant the law circumscribing in this way the permission granted to people by the licensing authorities to drive mechanically propelled vehicles on the public road.

In this respect I must take the stand that there is no inherent or fundamental right vested in anybody to drive, any more than there is an inherent and fundamental right for anybody to posses a firearm. If there are any fundamental rights involved in this matter, it is the right of the community to be protected from unnecessary danger to life and limb in our citizens' normal everyday activities. It is only fair that only those who are licensed to use the roads in this way should be permitted to do so. It was inevitable that it would be decided that people would have to be licensed before they were allowed to use the roads in this way.

I do not for one moment think that all the talk here of the alleged unconstitutionality of some of the proposals in the Bill is anything other than nonsense. Even if it were not nonsense, however, and if we found that what is proposed in this Bill was unconstitutional, it would surely be justifiable to make it a condition for the obtaining of a licence to drive that the applicant agree to allow his fitness to drive to be tested in the manner laid down in this Bill.

Deputy Lemass and other Deputies referred to what were described as statistics of accidents arising from the consumption of alcohol. Deputy Treacy also referred to this matter but not in the same trusting way, not placing such implicit confidence in the accuracy of these figures. The figures quoted here could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as statistics. In my opening statement, I pointed out, as did a number of other Deputies subsequently, that because of the obvious difficulty of determining whether a person who has been injured in an accident had his driving capacity adversely affected by the consumption of alcohol or not, the figures quoted were meaningless and without any value. There are no reliable statistics available on this matter and, in my opinion, it would not be possible to compile reliable statistics. It is, however, common knowledge which cannot reasonably be doubted that a great number of accidents are caused, or are partly caused, by the consumption of alcohol and everyone who has driven himself after only a moderate intake of alcohol, or who has been a passenger with a driver in this condition, or has driven behind somebody in this condition, knows that one's driving can be affected even long before becoming drunk in the normal sense.

This is a serious danger on the road and it is the easiest such danger to deal with. Even if there are more important causes, there is no reason why we should not deal as effectively as possible with this particular cause of accidents. It is only by a process of attrition that all the causes of accidents will be eliminated or reduced to a minimum. It is feasible to make consumption of a dangerous level of alcohol a specific offence and public interest demands that this should be done. There is no reason why the consumption of alcohol to a dangerous extent should ever occur unless an individual decides to commit this new offence which I am asking the Dáil to create.

Deputy de Valera pointed to the obvious fact that it will not be possible to test everybody in every pub and therefore there is likely to be evasion of the law when it is enacted. This, of course, is true, but at least everybody in every pub will know that this crime exists and that he is liable to a penalty if he commits it. He may be caught and he may not; it depends on the degree of responsibility of the public, and indeed on the weight of public opinion, whether the disregard of the law will be widespread or not. It may be that comparatively large numbers of people will decide to take the chance of breaking the law in this respect and it may be that a number of them will get away with it, but some will be caught and even if it is only, as Deputy de Valera suggested, one in 100, they deserve no sympathy when they are caught.

Deputy Fitzpatrick, who, I thought, made a reasonable contribution to the debate, said that he hoped to give adequate power to deal with the drunken driver, while at the same time amending the Bill substantially. This is not enough. I am asking for power to deal with more than the drunken driver. I thought I made it clear at the outset that the intention was to create a new offence. I want the Dáil to give me power to deal with the driver who is not drunk, as we all understand the word, who has not in fact been infringing the law up to now by driving after a certain consumption of alcohol. The drunken driver is the only type of case which conceivably can be caught by the present clinical examination. I maintain, and I substantiated it in my opening statement, that it has been scientifically established that in almost all, if not indeed in all cases, long before the stage of what we know as drunkenness is reached, the ability to drive with normal competency has been seriously impaired. I am asking the House to create this new offence and to enable it to be dealt with. In other words, this is not dealing with drunken driving as we know it.

I say that practically all and very probably absolutely all people who acquire this specific level of alcoholic content in their blood are impaired in their driving capacity. Even if it did happen on occasion that by a fortuitous combination of circumstances, some individual raised his blood alcohol content to the level specified in this Bill and still retained his capacity to drive unimpaired, it is still reasonable and justifiable to convict him of the offence of taking the terrible risk of making himself unable to avoid a fatal accident due to the selfish, reckless and inconsiderate consumption of alcohol. It is dangerous to the general public for a driver to raise the blood alcohol level to this degree. That is a scientifically established fact. We all know the terrible record of death and injury on the road and I ask the House to make this dangerous practice illegal and in itself an offence against the community.

Deputy Fitzpatrick asked me to give his method a trial and if it was found to be unsatisfactory after a few years, to come back and amend it, but the question is how are we to decide if it has been satisfactory? Are we to accept the number of deaths or maimings or disfigurements as a measuring stick and if so, how many accidents involving these things are we to accept as satisfactory? This is serious enough to warrant the Dáil giving this new power which I am asking for in this Bill. There were a number of criticisms of what I am asking the House to do in regard to the blood tests, and the urine tests in particular, and also in regard to the breathaliser test. Despite the fact that I thought I explained that the breathaliser test was not looked upon as a conclusive test and that I also explained why it was I felt I could not take it as a conclusive test, it did not seem to get home to all Deputies who spoke.

I want to make it clear again that the breathaliser test is taken only to enable the Garda to decide whether the other tests which are the conclusive ones should be carried out. I also want to repeat that the reason the breathaliser test has not been provided for on the same basis as the other tests is that it is not a reliable one, in its present state of development at least. It may be that in the future there will be further development which will make it possible to use the breathaliser test in lieu of the others and, if so, I certainly will be only too happy to bring in an amendment to that effect.

A number of Deputies objected to the making of the blood alcohol level conclusive evidence of an offence. In my opening statement on the Bill I explained at some length the reasons for which it was decided to make a specified blood-alcohol level conclusive evidence of a separate new offence and not prima facie evidence of the offence of driving while unfit, as recommended by the Commission. Deputy O'Higgins and a number of Deputies referred to the fact that the Commission which reported in May, 1963, recommended that this should be used as prima facie evidence of driving while unfit.

I have no doubt whatever that the course proposed in the Bill is the right one and that the considerations I mentioned in my opening statement constitute an overwhelming case for a departing from the recommendation of the Commission in so far as the use to be made of the blood-alcohol level is concerned. I should like to point out that the Commission did not rule out the introduction of a system under which the blood-alcohol level would be accepted as conclusive evidence at some future date. They merely considered at the time they reported which was May, 1963, that this was unlikely to be acceptable.

Since May, 1963, I think public opinion regard to this matter has become more intense. Accidents on the road have continued unabated despite all efforts to reduce them. It is my opinion, at any rate, that the creation of this specific new offence is called for, and that in view of the undoubted fact that it has been scientifically established that driving in practically all cases is impaired with the blood-alcohol level at this degree, it is certainly justified and necessary to make this blood-alcohol level conclusive evidence of the commission of this offence.

There were some criticisms also of the fact that refusal to give a specimen will be an offence which will carry with it the same penalties as committing the basic offence. I think there is every reason for this. If a refusal to provide a blood or urine sample is to carry a smaller penalty than the penalty for having the actual blood-alcohol content of 125 mg., there is obviously an incentive for someone who knows well that his blood-alcohol content is over this level to take the easier course, the course carrying the lesser penalty, and refuse to give a specimen. I indicated in my opening statement that it was necessary to keep the penalty for this at the same level for that reason. Otherwise we would have the situation that those who were really bad cases, and knew they were, could opt for the lesser penalty. They would have this way out, whereas borderline cases who genuinely believed they were not infringing the law in this regard would, if they were found to have a blood-alcohol level over the specified amount, suffer the major penalty. I think it is fully justified that this should be done.

As I said, a number of Deputies queried whether the provision in regard to blood testing and the treating of it as conclusive evidence of an offence was in accordance with the Constitution. Deputy Dillon, in particular, who is, of course, known to be such a great admirer of the Constitution, was particularly vocal in this respect. The Article of the Constitution which was quoted is Article 40, section 3, which reads:

The State guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate the personal rights of the citizen. The State shall, in particular, by its laws protect as best it may from unjust attack and, in the case of injustice done, vindicate the life, person, good name, and property rights of every citizen.

I have sufficient confidence in the courts to believe that they will not consider it a right of an individual to drive a mechanically propelled vehicle after he has raised his blood alcohol level to a degree which makes him, while driving, a danger to himself, his passengers and other road users.

As I said already the community as a whole has rights. I believe the community has a right to protect itself from the dangerous activities of individuals. I am confident that there is nothing in the Constitution to prevent this. I agree that the interpretation of the Constitution is a matter for the High Court, and ultimately for the Supreme Court, and it would be a matter for those Courts to decide whether the provisions of the Bill are repugnant to the Constitution, but this threat of Deputy Dillon's to have this Bill, if enacted, declared unconstitutional does not impress me.

I am quite satisfied that it is justifiable to circumscribe the licence that is given to people to drive on the roads in the same way as it is to circumscribe the licence that is given to some people to have possession of firearms by such things as preventing their discharge within a certain distance of the public roads. The legal advice available to me is to the effect that it would not be an undue interference with personal rights to provide for the taking of blood specimen even to the extent of authorising the use of force, if necessary. The provisions of the Bill in relation to the taking of specimens and the consequences of a refusal to provide a specimen implement the recommendations of the Commission. The Commission itself — the members of which included the President of the High Court, a district justice and the Chief State Solicitor — believed that its recommendations were in consonance with the letter and the spirit of Article 40. They stated also that they would see nothing unconstitutional in legislation under which even the forcible taking of a blood specimen from a person who refuses to give one voluntarily would be authorised. I am not going nearly that far in the Bill.

The Commission stated — and I am sure every Deputy will agree with this — that every citizen who makes use of the streets and roads of this country is entitled to expect that the State shall, by its laws, make adequate provision to ensure that his life and person shall not be endangered by some other person driving a vehicle while he is unfit to do so. I am perfectly satisfied that the enactment of this Bill is essential if we are to be able to say that we are defending and vindicating the personal rights of our citizens and, by our laws, protecting as best we may the lives and persons of our people from unjust attack. In these circumstances, it is my view that the provisions of this Bill are not in any respect repugnant to the Constitution.

As I said, references were made here to causes of accidents other than driving when the capacity to drive had been impaired by the consumption of alcohol. There was, for instance, reference to the dangers created by animals wandering on the road. I quite agree that wandering animals are a menace and that we must do everything possible to ensure that animals will not be allowed to wander without control on the road. However, we must remember that animals have to be moved in pursuance of farmers' normal operations and that it is not always feasible for a farmer to have such control over animals as a person who wants to drive at a rapid rate along the road would desire. Motorists will have to accept this and arrange their method of driving accordingly.

I agree that animals must not be allowed to wander uncontrolled but, with the best will in the world, it is not always possible for a farmer to ensure that his fences are impregnable. It is much more difficult for the farmer to ensure this than it is for the motorist to ensure that he will not have an accident. I agree that it is my duty to do everything possible and reasonable to ensure that animals will not wander uncontrolled on the road and that it is the duty of land-owners to try to ensure this also. However, fences will deteriorate imperceptibly and eventually, on occasions, despite the best care of the farmer, will succumb to the continuous probing of farm animals. It can often be through no culpable negligence of the farmer that such animals do get on to the public road. In these circumstances, it is right to expect that the motorist should always be in a position to avoid accidents just as, in the same way, children will occasionally avoid the most meticulous and vigilant parental control and wander or dash on to the road. I think we are entitled to expect that motorists should always have such control over their vehicles as to be able to avoid accidents in these cases.

I have no sympathy at all with the attitude — which, I am sorry to say, was more evident on my own side of the House than on the other side of House — that roads exist for the convenience of motorists and that it is the job of the Legislature to keep them clear and in such condition that motorists can use them in the most efficient way possible from their point of view. I have no sympathy at all with that point of view. I agree that we should do our best but that the primary duty is on the motorist to avoid accidents. I think we must continue to place that primary responsibility on them.

Speed, as a cause of accidents, was also referred to. A number of Deputies suggested that there should be a general speed limit either all the time on the roads or in some cases after lighting-up time. I am inclined to agree, in principle, with this. Even if speed itself cannot be shown to cause accidents — nobody can say with certainty that it does not cause a great number of accidents — it is beyond doubt, I think, that speed does cause many accidents that otherwise might not be so serious or even fatal. Therefore, if it were possible to enforce an over-all speed limit it might be justifiable to do so. I have not any immediate intention of doing anything like this but I certainly do intend to give it serious consideration. It is a fact that people, particularly if they are in a hurry, will tend to drive as fast as is convenient in the particular car which they are driving, as fast as they themselves believe to be reasonably safe. This immediately raises the problem of the enforcement of any such regulation. The problem may be so serious that it might even be justifiable to try to provide that it would be an offence to manufacture a car capable of going over a certain speed but that would have to be done at international level rather than by anything that we could do here.

Deputy Dillon made some suggestions which I think he did not really seriously believe in himself. The suggestion that people who require hospital treatment would be brought, instead, to the Garda station is, as I think he probably knows himself, nonsense. I have never heard of a case where even an obviously drunken driver who was injured was brought to a Garda station rather than to a hospital. I am sure that if such a case ever occurred, it would not go unnoticed.

Deputy Dillon also ignored the fact that a doctor will have to be called to take a specimen and I for one cannot imagine any doctor consenting to the taking of a specimen from a person who is obviously in need of urgent medical attention. I do not think the Garda really deserve the opinion that Deputy Dillon seems to have of them.

In this respect also I might refer to Deputy Lemass's allegation that the powers in this Bill are likely to be used in a vindictive way by gardaí. I do not think this Bill presents any greater scope for victimisation than a great many other measures which have to be enforced by the Garda. I do not say it is impossible that some cases of victimisation may arise. I do hear allegations of this occasionally, but very seldom — and I do not think there is a lot in it.

Deputy Lemass also dealt at length with what will happen to a person who drives home at 11 o'clock and after he arrives home takes a few drinks. He seemed to think that a garda could forcibly enter that person's house at I a.m. and require him to undergo a preliminary breath test and possibly even arrest him for this offence of driving while under the influence of drink although it was two hours previously that he had, in fact, driven home. This, of course, is completely out of the question. A person can be required to undergo a preliminary breath test only if he is in charge of a vehicle in a public place. A Garda, therefore, cannot come to a man's house some hours after he has been driving and ask him to undergo this preliminary test and, in fact, in such circumstances a garda would not have any power forcibly to enter the man's house.

Deputy Tully believed that it was unfair to treat a man who goes into the back of his car to sleep off the effects of alcohol as committing an offence. I must say that I agree with him. That, in fact, will not be the position under this Bill. Under section 50, subsection (4), of the Road Traffic Act, 1961, a person who is charged with being in charge of a mechanically-propelled vehicle while under the influence of drink or a drug must show, inter alia, that he had not driven the vehicle between his becoming unfit and the time he came under the notice of the Garda. Otherwise, it is presumed that he has committed an offence under section 50.

As I said, I quite agree that the person who recognises that he is unfit and stops his car until he is fit to drive again should be able to do so without fear of being prosecuted for being in charge of a car while unfit. Section 31 of the Bill deals with this problem and, I think, removes the objections against the present section. Under section 31, the onus on the defendant will be to show only that he did not intend to drive or attempt to drive. It will no longer be necessary for him to show also that he had not driven between the time he became unfit and the time he came under the notice of the Garda. I think, therefore, that that difficulty will be adequately dealt with.

Deputy Tully also mentioned the question of hand signals being required in the driving tests and said they were out of date and should not be included in driving tests. My own personal view about hand signals is that they are very important. Mechanical signalling devices can go out of order.

Mr. James Tully

Does the Minister's driver give them?

Mr. Boland

I do not know whether he does or not.

Mr. James Tully

You know darn well that he does not.

Mr. Boland

Mechanical signalling devices can go out of order and can be out of order without the driver knowing it. Apart from that, I think the present type of mechanical signalling devices may often not be visible to people who would be concerned. Take the case where a car is intending to turn to the left and there is a cyclist between the car and the kerb and past the rear of the car. He cannot see a mechanical signal.

Mr. James Tully

How will he see the hand?

Mr. S. Dunne

That is not the best example.

Mr. Boland

There are other examples. We see cars driving along the road with the signals going, although the driver has no intention of turning. While we can provide that it is an offence not to have signals in working order, we still know that they can go out of working order without the driver being aware of this and the mere fact that it is an offence to have them out of order is not any great consolation to somebody who is involved in an accident because the driver was not so aware.

Mr. James Tully

In small cars you cannot use a hand signal at all.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order.

Mr. James Tully

In most of the small cars the window is in such a way that you cannot use a hand signal. It is a silly thing.

Mr. Boland

I am only giving my own personal opinion that hand signals are more reliable than mechanical signals.

Mr. Coughlan

If there is only the one person sitting in the car, in the driver's seat, how can the indication be given by hand that he is turning to the left?

Mr. Boland

I think the driver in such a case will be much better able to indicate by hand that he is going to his left than by merely switching on a mechanical signal which cannot be seen.

Mr. Coughlan

He cannot open the left window.

Mr. Boland

He can definitely indicate by hand, if he wishes, to a person on his inside, that he intends to turn to his left.

Mr. S. Dunne

He might be had up for that sort of gesture.

Mr. Boland

He cannot do it effectively with a mechanical signal at the rear of the car. However, I do not think there are many people who fail to get a certificate of competency because of this question of hand signals.

Deputy Tully also argued that it was ridiculous that persons should be refused certificates of competency on successful completion of a driving test because the application for the test was not signed by the applicant himself. There is an obvious reason for requiring that the signature on the application for the test should be the same as the signature of the person actually performing the test but I am aware that cases have occurred in which applicants for driving tests, for no ulterior motive, just have not themselves signed the application forms. As a result, the position was that tests carried out in such cases were regarded as invalid and where certificates of competency would otherwise have been given, these were withheld and the people concerned were required to do a further test. I have had this problem under consideration having regard to the fact that the majority of cases of this nature which arose appeared to me to be genuine and to have caused considerable inconvenience and additional expense to the people involved. Early in February last I directed that a revised procedure should be operated which will, as far as possible, prevent these cases from occurring while continuing to a large degree the safeguards against "substitutes for tests" provided by the system of signature checks.

Mr. James Tully

The signature on the provisional licence is the real thing.

Mr. Boland

That is not a sufficient check. In these cases it is believed that some people may have gone so far in their efforts to get a certificate of competency as to get people to substitute for them. But I agree that in the majority of cases which came to my notice that was not the position. There was no attempt to obtain a certificate by fraudulent means. It was just due to a habit that exists in many places of there being only one member of the household who fills up forms and a lack of appreciation of the difference between a signature and just putting down a person's name.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): It is a habit which should be discouraged.

Mr. Boland

It is but, at the same time, in genuine cases, it is reasonable to make it possible for such a person, where no fraud was intended, to obtain a certificate without undergoing another test.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): Could the Minister say what the present position is? I understood him to say he had altered the procedure?

Mr. Boland

If it can be definitely established that the person undergoing the test is the person who is actually applying for the driving licence, and therefore for the certificate of competency, then it can be granted. But it does put such a person to extra trouble in order to establish that, and the advisable thing for the person to do is what he is told to do in the form: sign the application form himself.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): Surely that could be got over on the spot by the tester bringing the applicant to the Garda station and getting him identified?

Mr. Boland

It is got over with as little inconvenience to the person as possible; but, at the same time, as Deputy Fitzpatrick himself has said, it is desirable to discourage this practice of there being one person in the family who signs all these things.

Mr. James Tully

What is wrong with it unless it is a legal document?

Mr. Boland

It is generally agreed that it is desirable to have a driving test, that it is desirable in present circumstances to establish that any person who wishes to be awarded a driving licence is competent to drive a car. Therefore, it is necessary to ensure that the person actually applying for the licence should undergo the test. These safeguards are necessary.

The other point which attracted most criticism was this proposal to restore power to the Minister for Justice to remit ancillary disqualifications. This generally seemed to be considered undesirable. I quite agree no Minister for Justice would be particularly anxious to have this power, but I made it clear in my opening statement it was only in the particular circumstances of ancillary disqualifications that this power was being sought. I have noted, however, that there seems to be a general opinion that, despite the fact that some unintended hardship may be caused in some cases, this power should not be taken and I will reconsider the matter between now and Committee Stage and see if there is any other method by which this can be dealt with.

The method suggested by Deputy Fitzpatrick and Deputy O'Higgins has some objections, that is, that it should be made automatic, that when a person appeals against a disqualification on his licence, the disqualification will not operate until the appeal is heard. Obviously, that could be used in some circumstances by people to postpone the inevitable date of coming into operation of the suspension. But it may be we will decide that that disadvantage is more than compensated for by the removal of the unnecessary hardship that would be caused. I will consider that between now and Committee Stage.

There were a number of other points raised which could possibly be left over to be dealt with on Committee Stage. Deputy Barrett, for instance, raised the question of compulsory insurance and suggested it should be extended to cover the actions of passengers in vehicles. The major difficulty here is that this would involve the insurers becoming liable for the actions of a wide range of people, people completely outside their control and selection. To secure this would involve an increase in premiums that might be quite substantial. It is open to a person to secure, if he likes, extra cover for the actions of passengers. Deputy Barrett wanted to make that compulsory. I do not know that that would be advisable.

Mr. T.J. Fitzpatrick

(Cavan): If the Minister looks into the matter, he will find the law on the subject is in a state of uncertainty at the moment. Even the Supreme Court, by a recent decision, seems to suggest that in certain circumstances the owner of the car might be liable for the negligence of passengers. Some insurance companies seem to accept liability; others seem to refuse to accept it.

Mr. Boland

That is the difficulty of making it compulsory, that the insurance companies would be taking on more than they believe they take on at the moment and would probably adjust their premiums accordingly. Deputy Barrett also referred to the offence of dangerous driving causing death or serious bodily harm and contended that the State tended to send all cases of this kind to the Circuit Court and that this involved a waste of time of the courts. Sections 48 to 50 are intended to deal with this matter. It should be possible to deal with cases of this kind under section 49. However, we will probably deal with this and most of the other points raised on Committee Stage.

Question put and agreed to.

Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 26th April, 1967.